How I Saved Money on Our Disney Vacation

My family has done two Disney Cruises and next month we are going to Disney World for the first time.  I've blogged several times about my obsessive planning (find Disney Cruise posts here, and the Disney World post here), and I've worked hard to make our trips really fun for my family.  I really love to plan, but more than that, I love to save money.  I swear, no matter how much money we ever have, I know I will always be on the hunt for a bargain.  I hate to pay full price for anything and Disney is no different.  Disney does not have any reason to discount things, so I had to do a little research and find out the best way to save money without actually changing our trip and leaving out things that we wanted to do.  The ideas that I'm going to share with you aren't going to get you huge savings, but I look at as anything I save can be used towards something else fun later on.  Disney is definitely not cheap, but being the frugal person I am, I'll take any savings I can get.

*Disney has recently done away with the Disney Vacation Account program.

Ok, here's first task at hand..Open a Disney Vacation Account (DVA) at least 120 days prior to your payment due date for your cruise or trip to the parks.  This is a free service, and acts like a savings account.  You set your goal amount that you need to save, add the goal date, and then can either set up recurring contributions or do one time contributions anytime you'd like.  You can make your final payment directly from your DVA.  So, why use this and not your regular bank account?  For every $1000 you pay out of your DVA, Disney will send you a $20 Disney Gift Card.  When we did our cruise, I just took those cards with me on the ship and had them add it to our on board account for any extras we did while sailing.  Our Disney World trip is costing just over $4000, so I'll get $80 in gift cards for us to use (because I know the kids are going to want souvenirs and that sort of thing) while we are in the parks.  $80 for adding money to an account? Totally worth it to me.

The next way that I saved can be done a handful of ways, but I'll only go into detail on the one that is tried and true for me.  I pay for our entire trip with Disney Gift Cards.  Say what??  One of the fun things about the DVA is that you can add funds from Gift Cards instead of from your bank or credit card.  I know you're thinking, "Why would she want to do that?"  Don't worry, I'll tell you.  Do you have a Sam's Club near you or a Sam's membership to shop online?  If so, you can buy Disney Gift Cards there at a discount.  They sell $150 in cards (three $50 cards per pack) for $142.98.  That means for every $150 in cards you buy, you save $7.02.  For our vacation, I bought 29 packs of cards which equaled a $203.58 savings on our trip.  I added all 87 of those cards to my DVA and then called my final payment in to Disney.  If you don't have a Sam's near you, I know there is another way to buy gift cards and save, but since I've not tried it I can't speak much about it, and it also seems like a lot more work.  There is a website called raise.com where people sell gift cards they no longer want at a discount.  You can purchase Target gift cards there at a varying discount (some even use their Target RED Card for additional savings), and then they go to a Target store and purchase Disney cards there.  I did the math when I was researching all of this for our cruise and it was easier for me to just go to Sam's and buy my gift cards there.  It was a small amount of effort on my part, but totally worth it to save over $200, plus get the $80 in bonus gift cards I will receive from my DVA account.  

Disney World Planning in Progress

I have planned and gone on two Disney Cruises (find all of my cruise posts here) with my family now, so I feel a little like a pro when it comes to that aspect of Disney.  We'd planned on booking another cruise while onboard the Disney Wonder in January, but decided at the last minute that we'd like to try our hands at Disney World for our next family vacation.  Once I had nailed down dates, I did what I do best and started obsessing over trip planning.  I thought there was a lot to learn to plan a cruise, but holy heck, Disney World planning is nuts!

The first thing I did was talk to our Disney travel agent and get some advice from her on places to stay, the amount of time to stay, and get information on package options.  If you are going to plan any type of Disney trip, I highly recommend using a Disney authorized travel agent.  They are free to use and it has been such a tremendous asset in planning our vacations.  I can't say enough good things about Carrie Johnson at Small World Vacations.  If you need an agent, she's been an amazing help for all our trips.  She recommended 5-7 days in the parks for a first visit, and with our schedules we are able to do the full week.  I looked through the different resort options, did a little research, and based a lot of my decision making on price.  In the end I chose Port Orleans Riverside and when I asked our travel agent, she said liked that resort very much.  We also decided to do the Disney dining plan.  I've read reviews for pros and cons of the plan, and I really do think it will be the best option for my family.  We shall find out in October!

As soon as I had nailed down dates, resort, park tickets, and dining details I pretty much just started adding every bit of Disney World info I could find to my Pinterest board.  I have boards for Disney World and for Disney Cruises that you are welcome to follow to save yourself the time of searching through everything.  I am an obsessive planner, what can I say?

Aside from using our travel agent and Pinterest, I picked up a book called The Unofficial Guide to Walt Dinsey World 2016 from the library (recommended by my travel agent) that has more information than you can even imagine.  When I had no plan at all, this book was overwhelming.  Once I had mapped out a few things it became incredibly helpful and I just keep renewing it from my library instead of returning it.  I have used it a lot and definitely recommend it.

So far, the only other big planning thing I've had to do was make our dining reservations.  This was a really overwhelming task for me and I am not sure what I would have done if I hadn't been able to chat with my travel agent about it.  I'd read some different blogs and posts on Pinterest about how to best use the dining plan and recommended restaurants, but there are so many to choose from that I didn't even know where to begin.  My husband thinks I'm nuts, but I sat down and made an Excel spreadsheet to keep everything organized.  I had to first decide the order we wanted to do the parks in, and how many times we plan to go to each park because I opted out of Park Hopper tickets.  I just didn't see my family going from one park to another in the same day, so the cost didn't seem worth it to me.  I broke each day down into breakfast/lunch/dinner and kept a running total of what dining credits we'd be using for each meal.  I told my travel agent that we'd like to do some character meals, but didn't want them all that way, and she gave me an amazing list of her restaurant recommendations for each park.  I looked through the menus and reviews for each of those restaurants and then made my list of where we wanted to eat each day.  You may begin making dining reservations at 6am EST 180 days out from your vacation date.  There were a few restaurants that we really, really wanted to go to and I'd read that you have to be on right away to make reservations.  To add to the list of things I do that make my family think I'm crazy, I got up before 4am (because we are MST) to make our dining reservations.  I was able to reserve everything I wanted to, so to me it was worth it.  I lucked out and it was on a weekend, so I just took a nap later that morning to make up for it.

My next big planning task will be to figure out FastPass+ reservations.  Luckily I have a few friends who live in Florida that frequent Disney World and they've offered to give me some advice with this part of my planning.  I still need to figure out flights and a handful of other little things for the trip, but I feel like I've got the big things covered so far.  I love a good project, which is what this trip planning is.  I'm excited to share more of what I learn with everyone and we can't wait to experience the magic of Disney again!

The Art of Procrastination - Wrapping Up the School Year

In the fall I wrote this post about my need to get the kids back to school and back into a routine. Well, here is my late spring post about needing to get the heck out of school and dive head first into summer. The last few weeks of school always seem to be packed with projects, choir concerts, presentations, and craziness.  I've got to believe I'm not the only one who lives in survival mode for the majority of the month of May each year.  Show of hands please?

I'm a crazy planner, so it may come as a surprise to those of you that know me, to find out that I consider myself a professional procrastinator.  It is an art, and I don't mean to brag, but I'm sooooooo good at it.  Like, really, really good you guys.  I don't care if you tell me that something needs to be done months in advance, I promise you, I will complete whatever it is with approximately 12 hours to spare (on a good day).  Yes, I'm aware that this is stressful and is an unfavorable way to go about life, but I'm certain that I can't function any other way at this point.  I like to say that I work best under pressure.  I will have it written on every possible calendar and have a list of all the things I need to do to complete the task, but I will without a doubt be working right up until the final hour.  To make life a little more fun, my kids both seem to have inherited this trait from me.  To them it is no big deal at 7:00 am to mention that they have to take snacks to school, or to tell me at 7:00 pm that they have a big assignment due the next morning.  Every time this happens, we have a big talk about not waiting till the last minute, but deep down I can't even be mad at them.  I've been that way my whole life.

Yes, this is us...

procrastination

[proh-kras-tuh-ney-shuh n, pruh‐] 

noun

1.

the act or habit of procrastinating, or putting off or delaying, especiallysomething requiring immediate attention:

She was smart, but her constant procrastination led her to be late withalmost every assignment.

Both kids have had some major projects due the last couple weeks.  R is in 1st grade and her class was assigned a big animal research project at the beginning of the trimester.  I will say that we actually worked on that a little at a time for about two weeks prior to the due date.  We did however, still have a giant poster we had to make the night before.  She has one more project due next week and then she can sail into summer.  J is in 6th grade and also had a big project due last week.  Luckily the majority of the research for that had been done during class throughout the trimester, but again we were making a poster and cooking a Brazilian recipe the night before.  I'm pretty sure he feels like school should have ended after the presentation of that project because he'd worked so long on it.  Not much longer to go and he's done with all the big stuff.  So, we had a crazy little dash of projects in the last week, but I will say that both kids totally nailed them. 

We have made it through several projects, two presentations, a choir concert, the school carnival and field day. Not to mention that we've been to dance classes and a competition, baseball practice, and soccer practice/games.  There are 8.5 days left of school and I'm finally feeling confident that we are  going to make it through!  Summer will be here before we know it, at which point we'll gradually drive each other crazy until school starts again in the fall.

It is the circle of life folks.

.

Pregnancy & Infant Loss Remembrance Day

I've talked a bit about my many miscarriages, but after seeing a lot of posts about today being Pregnancy & Infant Loss Remembrance Day, I wanted to bring the topic up again.  

I remember being at a doctor appointment and mentioning the fact that we'd like to start trying to get pregnant.  The doctor rambled through some information about prenatal vitamins and then finished the conversation with a comment about 25% of pregnancies ending in miscarriage, and to not be surprised if that happened at some point.  He was really matter of fact, and it seemed really strange to me at the time.  I was one of the first of my friends to start having kids, so this wasn't a topic that I'd ever heard anyone discuss.  I brushed it off with a "that will never happen to me" kind of attitude and didn't think about it again.  Fast forward a few months to my first pregnancy, where I thought everything was going as planned.  I was 15 weeks along, in my second trimester, and we'd told people that I was pregnant.  I woke up one morning to find that I was bleeding and went in the next day for an ultrasound. By then the bleeding had pretty much stopped, so my doctor and I were still thinking everything was fine.  My doctor sent me in for an ultrasound anyway, and the next few days are really blurry.  I knew at the ultrasound that something was wrong because they told me to go out and wait for the doctor to call me in.  My doctor wasn't in, so I waited for someone I'd never met.  I left the office knowing little more than that the baby was no longer alive and that I was having a miscarriage.  That doctor didn't tell me anything other than "it happens" and that I should call my regular doctor the next day to schedule a D&C (I had no idea what that even meant).  I had the D&C procedure a couple days later, was still given almost no information (and at the time I didn't even know what to ask), and was told to wait three months and then try again.  I was 24 years old, healthy, and in good shape, so I really just wanted some sort of explanation.  It wasn't until years later that I requested my medical records and upon reading them, was able to get a little bit more information about what had happened.

I took a week off of work after that, and upon returning found that no one had told anyone why I was gone.  As if losing the baby wasn't bad enough, I then had explain to people over and over, that I'd lost the baby and was not pregnant anymore.  This was my first experience with just how little this subject is spoken about.  I kept a lot to myself over the next few years, until one day I couldn't take it anymore.  I had a different blog back then and just suddenly sat down and wrote out my story.  The huge amount of relief that I felt after getting that all out to everyone I knew was incredible.  I had no idea just how much I was suffering by not talking about anything.  I started to talk a lot with other girls who'd gone through the same thing, with people who hadn't and wanted to know how to handle the situation when it happened to someone they knew, etc.  Eventually I found even more healing when I started volunteering for a non profit organization called Kids For Kyla, which gives grants to people trying to adopt or going through infertility treatments.  The founders are friends of mine who went through their own difficult journey and then went on to help others.  

I had the one miscarriage before having my son J, and then had four more before finally having my daughter R a month shy of J's 5th birthday.   I know I've mentioned it before, but we had every kind of test done that the doctors could think of and everything always came back perfectly normal.  Genetic testing, a few minor procedures, all sorts of things, but we never got any answers.  They just kept telling us "you should be able to have another baby."  In the beginning I got pregnant relatively quickly, but after awhile it started taking much longer.  Emotionally, the hardest miscarriage I had was the fourth one I had after having J.  It had taken me a year to get pregnant that time, and I was really hopeful because I'd made it to 9 weeks (which was farther than I had the few times before that).  I think it was after that one that I finally started telling people what was going on.  I couldn't take the comments from people about "you guys need to hurry up and have another one!" and "don't you think J needs a brother or sister?"  After all of my experiences with that, I would never dream of asking someone if they are going to have a baby, or to tell them they should have more.  You have no idea what people are going through, and there is nothing worse than hearing those things when you are struggling.

After years of telling my story, and talking to others about their experiences, I backtracked and stopped talking again.  A few years ago we decided that we'd like to have another baby, but again that proved to be easier said than done.  Due to my history, from the day I found out I was pregnant, they'd had me come in for blood work every 48 hours.  At first things looked good, but then the numbers wouldn't go up the way they were supposed to, and then they would, and then they wouldn't.  This dragged on for weeks, and the whole time I knew that things weren't ok.  I had been through so many losses, and I started having a gut feeling on how things were going to go each time I got a positive pregnancy test .  I can't really explain it, other than that when I found out I was pregnant with R, I just knew she was eventually going to be mine.  I'd had the same feeling with J, and I've never had that with any other pregnancy.  That was my sixth miscarriage and I went on with life without telling anyone other than my mom.  A year or so later we tried again and had a similar situation, but I didn't tell people anything.  After the seventh miscarriage I was emotionally and physically done.  It was the first time I'd really ever felt that finality, but I knew I couldn't do it anymore.  The relief I felt from that decision was remarkable.  

Long story long right?  I keep thinking I'll get to my point, but I keep thinking of more points. :) Miscarriages are unbelievably hard.  They are hard to talk about, especially if you haven't even told people you are pregnant to begin with.  I never could come up with how to start that conversation, so I just didn't.  You don't just suffer through that one period in time.  You see new babies born all the time, you pass due dates, things that you expected to be milestones for the baby, etc.  It is all just hard, and awful, and it kills me when I hear of someone going through something I know all too well. This has been talked about a lot lately in social media, but I don't think it can be said enough.  Mind your own business when it comes to other people and the fact that they haven't had kids at the "normal" time or frequency.  If you know someone who has suffered a miscarriage, just give them a hug, tell them that you love them, and just be there for them.  Do not, and I repeat, do not say "everything happens for a reason" or "it is probably for the best" or "you can try again!"  If you say these things, don't be surprised if someone eventually punches you in the face.  I had to hold myself back too many times to count.  

While it was incredibly difficult, looking back, I can't say that I'd change my situation.  My family wouldn't be what it is now, if I didn't go through everything I did.  I have a son and a daughter who fill up my life, and they are here because the others weren't able to be here with me.  I will always remember and hold a special place in my heart for those babies, but it is because of them that I have my babies here to hug every day.

Wrapping Up Summer

For many weeks leading up to the end of the school year, and thus the start of summer vacation, we count down the days with great anticipation.  The last day of school is an amazing and joyful day, and our thoughts are consumed with all of the relaxing and fun summer activities are upon us.  Birds are chirping, butterflies are flitting, and beautiful flowers are blooming.  It seems like it doesn't take long before reality sinks in, you start feeling like banging your head against the wall, and you realize you are secretly counting down the days until the kids go back to school.  Oh, is that just me?  I can't imagine that I'm in the minority here am I?

I've become quite the creature of habit in my adult years, and as much as it pains me, I need some structure that summer just doesn't provide.  I used to think I was a "fly by the seat of your pants" kind of girl, but I guess I'm just not.  As it turns out, my kids really aren't either.  My younger self surely is shaking her head at all of my lists, calendars (yes multiple), and ability to plan things months and years in advance.  I just like to know what's coming, OK?  

Christmas vacation is great.  It is just the right amount of time to relax, get some stuff done, and then send the kids back to school right around the time they start fighting with each other non stop.  I'm not one to entertain my kids at all times (see this post for more of an explanation), but unless you plan at least few things here and there, everyone seems to lose their minds mid summer.  We keep pretty busy with some vacations and also with sports stuff over the summer, but in between that, things get a little crazy.  My son would be perfectly happy if he could just hang out at home doing whatever he wants at all times.  My daughter wants to be around people all the time and has a never ending need to "go do something."  This leads to lots of disagreements and bickering between the kids, and leads me to that banging my head against the wall place I mentioned earlier.  I'd be happy with a nice mixture, of some days with nothing to do mixed in with some busy days in between.  I'd also love to just go run errands or do things that I want to do without opposition from the kids.  I think these are things only found in fairy tales though.

I felt like I was doing pretty well for most of the summer, but as I write this, I realize that it is because the first half of our summer was very full of scheduled plans.  I had lots of things I could put on a calendar and be able to stick to a pretty solid routine.  I keep a calendar on my phone that is linked to my husband's calendar, and I also keep a dry erase calendar on the refrigerator.  At the end of each month, I erase everything and write in all of our daily happenings for the next month.  I look at it multiple times a day and like to think I always know what's going on.  From the end of the school year, until the first week of July, our calendar was very full.  Dance classes, dance recital, baseball, a couple vacations, races my husband was running, etc.  Every day had something written on it.  When I did the July calendar, we hardly had anything.  Literally nothing other than baseball practice and games.  It made me feel uneasy, and I'll admit to several moments of panic because I kept feeling like I was forgetting to be somewhere.  I guess I work better if I have a solid routine to follow, even though I always thought I could just wing it and be fine. 

Carefully planned schedules and "To Do" Lists make me happy.  

The last part of July and this first part of August I've been a hot mess.  The lack of  things on the calendar apparently turned me into a complete idiot and I have (hopefully temporarily) lost my ability to handle any sort of scheduling.  In the last week or so, I've managed to over book too many things to count.  I'm not sure if that nearly blank July calendar sent me into the mindset of "oh we have nothing going on, that works great!" or what my problem is, but I've made some ridiculous scheduling errors.  I signed my daughter up for a two week session of swimming lessons (the last session available, because I forgot to sign her up for the previous session), and they asked me "Would you like to sign her up for a half session or the full session?"  What that turned into was "Here take my full session payment, but she'll really only come the first week because I don't remember that I already have her signed up for a mandatory dance camp during the second week."  After that I ended up having to cancel a hotel reservation for this weekend.   My son has a three day soccer tournament out of town and I somehow booked two things, in two different cities on Saturday.  It isn't easy to be two places at once, so I'll have to drive back and forth a couple times instead of getting to stay overnight. Oh, and the Friday night we were supposed to stay at the hotel, I also realized I was going to have to skip my Bunco group (which has been on my calendar since May, and is also my rare night out alone) because we'll be at the soccer tournament.  After figuring out everything for this weekend, I thought I had my shit together.  That was until a day this week at 5:20pm, where my husband called and said something along the lines of "Did J get to soccer ok today?" in reference to his practice that starts at 5:00pm.  My answer to this was a flustered "Shit, no, I forgot to take him.  We are leaving right now."  He thought I was joking, but I was totally serious.  No big deal, only 30 minutes late to practice.  My mind is on vacation, and I really need it back.

I find it so funny how many things we look forward to, and then by the time we actually there, we count down the days until it is over.  In the winter we are too cold and can't wait for warmer weather, in the summer we are just too hot and can't wait for fall.  At this point, I don't care about the temperature, I just want to be able to use my brain again.  Hopefully it coincides with the kids going back to school.  In the meantime, I hope my friends and family have some patience with me.  12 more days till school starts!

Traveling With My Kids

We didn't do a lot of traveling when I was a kid.  We would take road trips to to see my grandparents,  sometimes to go see my cousins (but usually they came to us), and we went on a few little family vacations, but we didn't go to a lot of new places.  A lot of our vacation time was spent camping on some land my family owns up in the mountains, which was incredible and now I get to take my kids there.  The only times I really ever flew anywhere was to go to gymnastics meets (more about my gymnastics here) that were out of state.  As an adult, I've made long lists of all the places I want to travel to and am slowly checking things off.  It has been really amazing to be able to take the kids on trips with us, and I love that by the time they are my age, they'll already have an incredible list of places they've visited.

Early on in our marriage we talked about how important it is for us to be able to "go do stuff." We love to go on little adventures like camping at the lake in Wyoming or Nebraska, but we also love to take big trips too.  When we bought our house almost 12 years ago, we thought we'd stay a few years and then buy something bigger.  Along the way, we realized that we are totally fine with our house, and we'd much rather stay here and be able to take a lot of family trips, than buy a bigger house and be limited in the adventures we can have.  We've been able to travel a lot and I wouldn't trade those experiences with my family for anything.  My son is 11 and he's been to 14 states and three countries.  He's traveled by car, by air, by train, and by boat.  My daughter is 6 and has been to 12 states and three countries, but hasn't gotten to travel by train yet.  Our trip in December/January will take them to Texas, St. Thomas, Tortola, and San Juan, Puerto Rico, so they can add some more places to their list.  Being able to travel like that never even crossed my mind as a kid.  For them to be able to not only learn about new places, but experience them first hand is pretty remarkable.

I have a few things I try to always do when we travel.  I'm sure we'd be fine if I did things differently, but I'm of the opinion that you stick with what works, so I don't try to mess with things.  Also, I get major travel anxiety and have some pretty super OCD tendencies, so changing things up isn't really an option for me. :)

- 99.9% of the time I take the very earliest flight possible when leaving for a trip.  This often means waking up at 2:00am, but it is worth it to me.  I pull the kids out of bed, they get dressed, get in the car, and go back to sleep for the hour long drive to the airport.  Once we are there, we check in, go through security, and then eat breakfast.  By the time we are done it is time to get on the plane, where the kids often go back to sleep again.

- I let the kids pack their carry on bags.  They grab a backpack and put whatever they want in it.  I used to pack the bag for them, but I never have to hear "I'm bored, I don't have anything to do" now that they are responsible for what is in their bag.  I actually get a kick out of seeing the things they opt to take.

- We always pack a treat.  We don't do a ton of candy at our house, but we always take some when we travel.  When I was growing up, my mom would keep a bag of gummy candy and we'd get a piece every hour of the road trip if we had made it through that time without fighting.  It is something I always loved, and so I do it with my kids too.  Plus, I personally require gummy bears to fly and I don't like to share.  The kids can pick out their own treat and I get to keep mine to myself.

- We get to the gate and hang out there.  My husband likes to stress me out and wander around the terminal while we are waiting to board.  I like to have eaten, and taken the kids to the bathroom prior to stopping at our gate so that we are ready to board when it is time.  He knows this drives me crazy, but wanders around anyway and upping my anxiety level every time we travel.

- I prefer to fly Southwest for a variety of reasons, but my biggest one is that I like to be able to pick my seats (without paying extra for them) because I want to sit in an even numbered row.  I have a major aversion to odd numbers, and I like to be able to choose to sit in a row that doesn't end in 1,3,5,7, or 9. Some of my friends have suggested that this makes me look a little nuts.  I, however, find this to be totally rational. :)

We just got back from a trip to Nashville, and I realized what great travelers my kids are.  The kids and I took a flight a few days ahead of my husband and I was a little nervous about flying with both kids by myself.  I flew a few times with just my daughter when she was a toddler, but that was easy in my opinion.  I'd just strap her on my back in the Ergo carrier and cruise through the airport.  Now at six years old, she has a habit of lagging behind, and it doesn't bother her a bit if she can't see me.  I on they other hand, panic if I lose sight of her for two seconds.  When the four of us travel together, it seems like my husband and I just naturally take responsibility for one of the kids, so I am just not really used to having to keep track of both of them in an airport.  They were champs though and we sailed through checking our bag and car seat (you know, because I'm the Car Seat Nazi), through the giant security line, and to our gate.  The flight home went the same way, despite being delayed and late in the evening.  We have a big trip coming up again in January, which will involve almost 9 hours of travel flying home from San Juan, Puerto Rico.  I'm hoping they can manage to continue their streak of being awesome little travelers through that trip!

Raising Independent Kids

I've had people tell me that I'm lucky that my kids can entertain themselves.  This has always struck me as an odd statement, because I feel like it is something that should be a really normal thing.  My son has always been great at playing on his own and I really think he prefers it to playing with others.  My daughter does really love to play with friends, but she is can also play by herself for hours at a time.  They are both really creative kids, and I love seeing them play by themselves.

I mentioned in my post last week (found here) that I hate the need today's society has to constantly entertain our kids and provide them with structured activities.  I feel that in the long run, the only thing this does is hinder their ability to be creative and learn to entertain themselves.  I'll admit that with my first child, I was quick to sign up for library story hour, and a couple other mom and me classes, but I skipped every single one of those with my second child.  I spent those story time classes trying to corral an 18 month old into sitting and listening to a book, while all the other moms did the same thing.  Did it teach him to sit and listen?  No.  Did it socialize him with kids his age?  No.  Did he learn anything while we were there?  Again, no.  What it did do was drive me crazy and make me feel like a bad mom for not having a kid that would sit quietly and listen to story time.  Really though, none of the kids sat quietly and listened, because kids that age just don't do that.  Needless to say, my daughter never went to one and she's still managed to become a very social little girl who does great in school.  In my opinion, all of these classes mean a lot more to the parents than they do to the tiny kids that are being dragged to them.

Pinterest is one of my favorite things to waste time on, but it is also something that represents so many problems with parenting these days.  The whole philosophy of needing to plan out things for kids to do all day, every day just doesn't sit well with me.  Do I do some projects with my kids sometimes?  Sure I do, but 9 times out of 10, I let me kids do whatever they want to do.  We have a box full of paper, scissors, markers, crayons, paints, and other craft stuff and I don't typically dictate what they do.  My daughter makes projects almost every day, and I love seeing what she comes up with.  She cuts, pastes, colors, and designs, all sorts of little treasures all on her own.  That is what I think is beneficial to a child's development, not putting something that you partially made in front of them, and helping them or telling them how to assemble the rest of it.  Yes it is great for them to learn how to follow directions and put things in order, but it is also great for them to just be creative.  Also, my OCD tendencies always get in the way and I have a really hard time not helping them do things the way I think they should be done.  I learned several years ago that they have a lot more fun, and they are really proud of their stuff when I just back off and let them create.

I have watched so many people who are just exhausted at the end of the day because their kids need constant attention and don't know how to entertain themselves.  The parents move the kids from one activity to the next and dictate every playtime activity.  As soon as the kid has lost their attention span on one thing, then they are asking their mom or dad for something else to do.  I get it, kids attention spans aren't always great, but they really should be able to play on their own.  I've always loved listening to my kids play.  They are the voice of all the toys they play with, and their little conversations with themselves are hilarious.  My son would play for hours with cars, blocks, trains, anything a typical boy likes.  My daughter will set up elaborate Barbie or stuffed animal scenarios and play forever with no need for me to help her.  (Well, other than the occasional dress change on those tiny little Disney Princesses that wear rubber dresses.  What is the deal with making those impossible for kids to maneuver??)  This is something I love because they are perfectly happy and I get a little time to get my things done.  I have a friend who mentioned not having a free second in the day, and after being at her house one day I understood why.  Her son had no idea how to play by himself because she'd never let him try.  I think this happens a lot now and I really don't think it will be beneficial to the kids long term.

We've never had super structured days at our house.  Even when the kids were babies, we were kind of a fly by the seat of our pants family.  We had a time frame that I tried to stay around for naps and stuff, but the world didn't end if I had stuff to do and we skipped something.  I tried to stay with a similar schedule, but life doesn't always work that way and I think my kids are better off because of that.  They have always been able to adapt to schedule changes pretty well, which works out great when we go on vacation or have random things come up.  The thought of having to plan something out for them to do all day every day makes me crazy.

When I was growing up, we lived out in the country and didn't have other kids (just me and my two younger brothers) to play with.  We became really independent kids and went outside all summer long and just played.  We built forts, and made up our own games, played in our little creek, and ran around the pasture.  I can't imagine doing things any other way and I think it helped me grow into an independent person.  I have never relied on others to entertain me or give me things to do, and I'd love for my kids to continue on that same path.

People are moving so quickly towards the "Pinterest Parenting" way of raising kids, and it really scares me what all those kids are going to be like as adults.  What happens when kids grow up and move out on their own after being accustomed to someone providing them with something to do at all times?  Will they be able to complete a day of work when they are responsible for scheduling their day out and getting tasks done with no assistance?  I really hate that there are new moms out there who think they are doing the wrong thing if they haven't completed all of the things on the "100 Things to do With Your Kids This Summer" list they found on Pinterest, or that they haven't taken their baby to multiple "mommy and me" classes throughout the week.  Parents, it is ok to not plan out a full day of activities for your kids.  Further more, it is more than ok to just let your kids be kids and figure out on their own what to play with or what craft project to do.  Let them grow their independence and creativity.  I'm thankful to my mom for sending us out to come up with our own fun, and I'm sure that someday your kids will be too.    

Kids and Sports

I was a gymnast from the time I could walk, until I was 16 years old.  The only other sport I really ever did was dance, and that was because it was something that went hand in hand with gymnastics.  It was serious business and I was in the gym for around 25 hours a week for as many years as I can remember.  I truly did love the sport, so don't let this post make you think otherwise, but my heavy involvement and lack of being able to ever do anything else, is definitely something that influences the way I look at sports for my kids.  

The way kids were involved with most sports was a lot different when I was a kid, than it is for my kids now.  I say this with the exclusion of my gymnastics career, because that is a lot like the expectations of kids and sports today.  I feel like when I was growing up, that recreation sports were just that.  Recreation.  Today everything is a million times more competitive, and everyone starts involving their kids at much younger ages.  I know there was little league baseball, and soccer when I was little, but it wasn't a big deal and was mostly for fun.  Now, if you don't start your kid in soccer, t-ball, flag football, volleyball, or whatever other available activity made available from the time they are preschool aged, then you've done something wrong.  How will they ever get a college scholarship if they haven't been on the soccer field since the time they learned to run???  I have no doubt that there are people out there who truly believe that is the case.  People hand select their rosters for 7 year old baseball, softball, soccer, you name it.  Is it really necessary to dominate the rec league?  I'm sorry, but I'm also not going to pay any amount of money to send a five year old to a volleyball "skills" camp or whatever other nonsense there is for kids that age.  Plenty of people see value in things like this, but I am not one of them. The constant need to have kids involved in a structured activity makes me crazy, and I want no part of it. Send your kids out to the yard to play and kick a ball around, that's what they really need to be doing at that age.  I'll save my thoughts on the need to constantly entertain our kids for another post.  I'm sure this one will already be long enough.

I really started thinking about the insanity of all of this sports stuff last summer.  My son J was 10 years old, and completely obsessed with all things hockey.  For the record, depending on the time of year, he was already playing competitive club soccer, basketball, and baseball.  He talked to us about wanting to learn to play hockey and I actually had the thought "It might be too late for him to start, he's already 10."  What the??  10 is now too old to start a sport?  When I was a kid you tried new sports when you got to 7th grade and had school teams you could participate in.  Now, your kid joining a middle school team without ever having played the sport would blow everyone's minds.  Back to hockey... We'd gone ice skating a few months before my son asked about playing hockey, and to say he couldn't skate doesn't even cover it.  The kid couldn't go three feet without falling.  I'm not talking minor falls either, I mean he was full on wiping out every few steps.  He had a hockey stick and puck that he'd play with in the basement, but skating was not a skill he was even close to having down.  We decided that we weren't going to tell him no, and signed him up to start a skating skills class at our local ice haus.  He was twice the age and size of all the other kids in his class, but it didn't phase him.  He is an athletic and competitive kid, and he had his mind set on passing the three skating levels necessary to be able to play with a stick and puck.   I'm getting off track, but my point is, what in the hell is wrong with our society that I had to think twice about letting my son play a sport because age 10 is "too old to start".  We just hit the one year mark of him starting hockey, and the kid has absolutely blown my mind.  He is a goal scoring machine, dominates the games, has complete love for the sport, and is going to start competitive hockey (along with soccer, because they'll overlap a bit) this fall.  When I watch him play, I just know that this is his sport.  It fits his personality, he is really great at it, and he gets so pumped up for games.  What if I'd never let him give it a try?  By all other standards in this day and age, I shouldn't have because he hadn't followed the timeline of starting when he was in preschool.  I'm so proud of him for not paying attention to the fact that he was learning with kids half his age when he started, and that he just worked hard at something he loved.  None of those kids have advanced with him over the last year, and he now has joined the ranks of kids his own age.  He's a pretty kick ass kid, and to think that I hesitated before letting him give hockey a try because of his age makes me want to kick my own ass. 

I spent my entire youth in the same sport.  My mom let me try volleyball in 7th grade (after much begging and pleading), and I actually really liked it.  I ended up being way too tall for a gymnast, so volleyball would have probably been a pretty great sport for me, but I didn't get to keep at it.  I loved gymnastics, I really did, but as a kid I wanted to do all the things my friends were doing.  I feel like I missed out on so much because I was in such a specialized sport.  Gymnastics takes a huge commitment, and there just isn't time for anything else.  I practiced every day from 4-8pm and also on Saturday mornings, which doesn't leave any availability for other activities. Not only that, but I can't even count how many times I was told that other sports weren't a good idea because I could hurt myself, and if that were the case, my gymnastics would suffer.  I hated P.E. in school because I didn't know how to play softball, or soccer, or any of the things we did in class.  I always felt out of place and wished that I had gotten a chance to be on the fun teams with my friends. It is because of this, that I've always let my kids try whatever sports they want to.  With the exception of gymnastics, because let's be honest, I can barely get out of bed in the morning because my body thinks I'm 85 years old as a result of all my years in the gym.  I was so over committed to gymnastics, that I really have to think hard about my kids and what they do.  My husband on the other hand, grew up wanting to do a lot more, but getting really involved in sports wasn't something his parents were in to, so he didn't participate in much.  Don't worry about him though, he's making up for it as an adult who runs every race he can and is sponsored on a racing team.  We come from very different situations, and now we have to figure out how to balance me not wanting the kids too involved, and him wanting them to be involved in everything.  I'm trying to stick with the thought process of just letting them do whatever they want so long as I can manage the schedule.

Soccer season and baseball season always overlap for about 2-3 weeks each year, so my son misses a couple baseball practices while he wraps up his competitive soccer season. A couple of summers ago J had a baseball coach (mind you, this is in a recreational little league) who griped at him for missing a practice and said "You need to pick a sport, son."  I'm sorry, but at what point did we decide that at age 9, a child needs to determine what the only sport they are going to play from there on will be?  We never played on that guy's team again, and we've yet to "pick a sport."  J loves baseball, but wants to play other things, so we don't play year round competitive baseball like a lot of his friends do.  He does play competitive soccer for a couple of reasons.  One, he is really good at it, and two, there aren't really 11/12 year old recreation teams anymore because so many kids have "picked a sport."  If he wanted to stop, that would be his decision, and I'd have an extra chunk of money in my pocket each year, but he really loves to play.  I really don't see the value in limiting a young kid to one sport.  Physically, it is great for them to develop strengths that different sports provide.  Mentally, each sport requires a different level of focus and determination and I think they need to learn how to prepare and compete in different situations.  My little brother B is one of the best examples I can think of for why kids shouldn't pick just one sport.  That kid (I say kid, but he's 20 now) worked his ass off at every sport he's ever played.  He went through high school not just playing, but dominating every sport he played.  He ran cross country for a couple years, was the quarterback of the football team, one of the leading scorers on the basketball team, and an absolutely incredible baseball player.  He went through high school knowing he'd play a college sport and that it would just depend on which one would pay his way through school.  He went to junior college on a full ride for baseball, and now next year will be doing the same thing to finish college at a four year school on baseball scholarship.  I truly believe that he is such an incredible athlete because he played all the sports.  The mentality of making a kid choose a specialty by the time they are 10 years old is totally nuts.  You risk completely burning those kids out in a few years, at which point they'll quit and not have anything else they are interested in.  The stress and pressure this puts on kids is not healthy, and there is really not a point.  Why can't we just let our kids play sports because they love them?  

I don't really know how all of this developed.  You would think that all of the people my age with kids, would remember how much fun they had playing rec sports when they were little and would want their kids to have the same fun.  Instead, we now have to have signs like this posted at games...

I mean come on people, we need reminders of this?  There was actually a fight between parents a couple of years ago at the baseball fields here.  We now have rules stating you can not speak to the umpires during the game, and if you have a certain amount of incidents then you will be banned from the fields.  I can't even believe rules like that need to be in place.  When I was in high school I went to watch my younger brothers play baseball games almost every day all summer long.  The games were fun to watch, the kids enjoyed playing, and there was no nonsense.  It is something I remember so fondly, and it kills me that summer ball games aren't like that anymore.  Is it really too much to ask that people start acting like grown ups, stop living vicariously through their kids, and just sit and enjoy watching them play sports?  I mean, really.  

Car Seat Safety - Protecting Your Kids

I've had plenty of friends and family members give me a hard time about my obsession with car seat safety. I've had eyes rolled at me and I've been referred to by some as "The Car Seat Nazi".  I've never understood this, and why keeping kids as absolutely safe as possible in the car, is not at the top of everyone's list of things to do.  I've heard all sorts of comments like "We feel comfortable with our decision", or "We made the same choice with their brother/sister and they were fine", when it comes to car seat decisions, and it all just boggles my mind.  The thought process that because another person did something and ended up fine, is really what some people feel comfortable as a basis for their child's safety?  This makes absolutely no sense to me.

There are a lot of things in this world that we can't control when it comes to the safety of our kids. The kind of car seat you use, the way you fasten your kids in their seat, which direction they face, how long they use a car seat, these are all thing you have control over.  Car accidents?  They happen when you least expect them, which is why being prepared and safe is so important.  I literally feel sick to my stomach every time I see a little one facing forward when they shouldn't be, a toddler in booster seat, or even worse, a small child not in a seat at all.  I see people post pictures of their kids buckled incorrectly, or sitting without a booster with the seat belt behind their back and I want to tell them to please buckle their kids in correctly.  The few times that I've mentioned it, people always say they are fine with what they are doing.  I've also seen people comment and say "Never post a picture of your kids in their seat because you'll end up with people telling you they aren't in there correctly."  I guess maybe it is just me, but if my kids aren't safe, I'd be happy to have someone point that out to me.  

Yes, I realize there didn't used to be car seats, and people are alive today to tell about it.  Yes, people get away with not using the correct seat, or not using a seat all the time.  My question is, if you know better, and you know that you really have no control over if and when someone might hit you while you are driving, wouldn't it be in your (and your child's) best interest to make sure they are secured properly?  Does insisting that my kids be in the proper car seat make me a "Car Seat Nazi"?  I really don't feel like I'm being unreasonable here.

There are age, height and weight requirements for seats, and there are laws (differing by state) for car seat requirements.  Those are not suggestions, and are often minimum requirements.  There has been a lot of research done about what happens to babies and toddlers in accidents, and other recommendations made in order to keep your child as safe as possible.  Is it easier to flip your baby around and forward face at 12 months?  Maybe, but I don't really believe it to be any easier or harder to strap a kid in regardless of the direction.  The fact is, that it isn't safe and the odds are much higher for injury if they are forward facing in an accident at that age. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that you rear face until a minimum of two years old, and it is even better to continue rear facing until 3-4 years of age.  Here is a detailed explanation... Why Rear Facing.

A friend of mine was kind enough to let me use some pictures of her kiddos for this post.  The older of her two girls shown, sat rear facing until her 4th birthday. The little one just turned two and will stay rear facing until her 4th birthday just like her sister.  Looking pretty happy and comfortable if you ask me!  Most importantly though, they are well protected.

My kids both rode in 5 point harness seats well past their 6th birthdays.  My son stayed in a regular booster seat until he was 10 years old and had reached the height requirement to ensure a seat belt would cross his chest in the right spot.  The requirement is height of 4'9" AND 8 years old.  Not one or the other, but both.  The age is because of when their bones have reached a certain stage of development, and the height is for how the chest strap sits on their chest.  My daughter is now in a high back booster, and will be there for quite awhile still.  I don't feel comfortable with her, at six and a half, to sit properly at all times in a regular booster seat.  When she was outgrowing her 5 point harness seat, I did a lot of research, talked with the people at Car Seats for The Littles to find the best type of booster for her and for our cars, and then made my purchase.  I can't imagine putting a child younger than her in a regular booster seat, knowing that there is no way they'll always be sitting correctly.  I see people post pictures of their little ones asleep and folded over in their seats and wish they'd do some research.  This article is such a heartbreaking example of what can happen.  I'd read that article months ago, and while trying to find it for this post, was stunned by how many other similar articles I found.  It is just so incredibly sad how many children have died or been seriously injured all because they weren't properly restrained.

Picture from The Car Seat Nerd

Picture from Super Car Seat Geek

Last winter there was a blogger who boasted about how she'd put let her kid wear his puffy coat in his car seat if she wanted to.  Why?  Because she was the parent and that was her choice to make.  I hate, hate, hate shit like this.  So, you aren't going to do what is safe for your child because "no one is going to tell you how to parent"?  This one really confuses me.  If your child gets seriously injured or dies in a car accident, then that will really show people, won't it!?  Do you win if that happens?   It was shortly after reading her absolute nonsense, that I read about a two year old getting killed in a car accident because he was wearing a coat, and therefore not properly restrained.  If you know better, why don't you do better?  I know I could never live with myself if my child died as a result of me not taking proper car seat precautions.  The whole "all of my kids survived without car seats" kind of comments I get from people make me unbelievably furious. That's only the case because they were lucky and never got into an accident.  People, we know better now.  We know more about the development of kids skeletal system, what kind of car seats are right for each size/age, what happens to their little bodies in an accident, and what the catastrophic results can be if children aren't restrained properly.

I don't care if your kid "hates sitting rear facing", or "doesn't like sitting in a car seat" or my least favorite "we aren't going very far, so we don't need a car seat."  You are the parent, and it is your responsibility to take care of your children.  Kids don't know that they like forward facing better if you never give them the option.  Moving kids to a "big kid" seat isn't an accomplishment, or a milestone to be posted on Facebook, especially if your kid has no business being in that kind of car seat.  My kids never complained about being in their 5 point harness seats until they were older and started seeing friends in different kinds of seats, or not in car seats at all.  When they asked me why their friend got to ride in booster and they didn't, I had no idea how to answer them.  I just said some people make different choices, and my choice is to keep you as safe as I possibly can.  Like I said earlier, there are so many things in this world that we can't control, but if an accident were to happen, I want to know that I've done everything in my power to keep my kids as safe as I can.  Do your research, know why recommendations are what they are.  After that read a few stories from parents who lost kids because they weren't in the seat they should have been in.  I know for me personally, no amount of convenience is worth that risk.  

Stay At Home Mom Thoughts...

My kids are 11 and 6 (both "and a half", you know because that half year is super important to them), and I've been a stay at home mom for 99% of that time.  I went back to work 12 weeks after my oldest was born and quit my job six months later.  I've spent a lot of time over the past 11 years thinking about what I do, how to not screw it up, and most importantly how to maintain my sanity until both kids are adults and not living in my home anymore.

I'm not the person that when asked "What do you want to be when you grow up?" as a child, responded with "I want to be a mom."  I actually wanted to be a fashion designer for as long as I can remember.  I also remember saying many times, that I didn't want to have kids.  I have no idea when that switch flipped, but I grew up and knew I wanted to have kids. 

I feel like I need to share a little backstory here, so we'll start with that.  My son (we'll call him J) came to be relatively easily.  I say relatively because while I got pregnant with him within a couple months, it was our second time trying to have a baby.  I had a miscarriage at 15 weeks a few months before I got pregnant with J, and had a shitty group of doctors who did very little to explain to my 24 year old self what the hell was happening.   I got pregnant quickly after and the minute I held that baby in my arms, I knew that I was meant to be a mom.  He was a dream baby and I remember thinking "This is so easy and amazing, I want to have five kids."  When he was 18 months old, we decided we were ready for another baby.  I thought it would be easy, but I couldn't have been more wrong.  I spent the next three years desperately wanting another baby, but struggling with long bouts of not being able to get pregnant, followed by miscarriage after miscarriage.  I'd long since changed doctors, had every test in the book done (all normal), and had no answers.  I had declared that we'd see another specialist if I didn't get pregnant in the next month.  The universe must have known that I was at my breaking point, and I ended up pregnant with my daughter (we'll just call her R).  Two funny things about that... 1. I had said I wanted to be done having kids by the time I was 30, and she was born five days after my 30th birthday.  2.  I also said I'd never do to my kids what my parents did to me, and have their birthday be close to Christmas.  Her birthday is five days before Christmas (my son's is only three weeks after, so I ruined that plan times two).  We wanted to have one more baby, but after a couple more miscarriages, I felt myself slipping back into that dark place I'd been in between J and R.  When I felt that happening, we decided that we'd take permanent action and have definite knowledge about the size of our family.  Long story still a bit long, I went through a lot to have those little rascals, and to say I am thankful for them would be a giant understatement.

These two make happy and crazy all at the same time...

After putting myself through college, and working my way up in the business world, it was a pretty big switch to then stay home with the kids.  I have never felt comfortable answering the question of "What do you do?" with "I stay home with the kids."  Am I happy that's what I do?  Absolutely, but I guess I just don't like being defined by that.  As much as I love the kids, and love being a mom, I am not "just a mom."  Quite a few years ago I had someone act surprised when they learned that I had gone to college and had a Business degree.  That was a bit of a turning point for me, and sent me on a journey of finding ways to be both a mom and not lose myself in the process.  Bottom line, I learned to find things to do for me.  This blog, working as a health coach, crafting, reading,  refinishing furniture, sewing, making jewelry, that is my stuff.  Yes, I might make stuff for the kids, but it isn't because I feel like they need me to do it.  All of it is ultimately for me and because I like to do it.  Remember how I said I needed to find ways to keep my sanity?  This is cheaper than therapy...although, I haven't completely ruled that out. :)

My kids are changing, growing, and turning into different little versions of themselves on a regular basis.  The babies that I used to snuggle on my chest, are now made up almost entirely of long legs and don't fit on my lap anymore.  They are both full of personality and attitude, and I spend my time bouncing between loving the heck out of them and wanting to ship them off to live with their Nana.  I kid, I kid.  I want to keep them around, but there are days you guys.  There are days.   I love them to death, but seriously, they are always around!  As a stay at home mom, you really don't get many breaks from the kids.  In the last year, I've taken R with me to every hair appointment, dentist appointment, to physical therapy, to workouts, on shopping trips.  You name it, she's been there.  Such is the life when your kid only has half day (and who are they kidding with the term half day...depending on the day she was out either at 10:25 or 11:00) kindergarten.  I'd take her to school, either run workout really quick, or run teach dance class (yes I do that too!), and then go pick her up.  I laugh when people say "What do you do all day when your kids are at school?"  I tell myself often not to wish away time, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't ridiculously excited to have both kids in school all day next year.  

My biggest struggle as a stay at home mom has been finding time for myself.  That may sound selfish to some, but I fully believe that to be a good mom, wife, friend, whatever, that you have to have some time for yourself.  The few little bits of free time I do have, are often spent with me having little panic attacks thinking I've forgotten a kid somewhere.  For me personally, I start feeling a little crazy if I don't have any time to breathe and just be me for a bit.  I take barre classes (if you haven't done this kind of workout, you are missing out), and that is absolutely my happy place.  I can always tell when my husband senses that I'm about to lose my shit, because he says things like "Do you want to go to barre today?"  So, between barre and all of my crazy craft and sewing projects, I have time for me.  I'll say it again, staying home with my kids is an incredible opportunity and I am so thankful to do it.  That being said, I realized a few years ago that if I didn't learn to take "me time" that I wasn't going to look back at the opportunity with fondness and appreciation, but with bitterness and resentment.  My point is this, don't lose yourself.  You can be a mom, and still be you.  They aren't one in the same.  One other little tidbit of advice I have, came from a friend of mine before I had kids.  She was older, in fact I'd grown up being friends with her daughter, and it was the best marriage advice I've ever received.  She said something along the lines of "Don't focus everything on your kids.  You have to take time as just you and your husband too.  Otherwise, your kids grow up and move out, and you realize there is someone you have to live with now that you haven't gotten to know over the last 18-20 years."  She was speaking from experience, and I was hearing lots of stories about how she'd spent every minute focusing on her kids and when they moved out, she realized she didn't know her husband anymore.  I made a mental note and I've thought about it many, many times over the years.  We go out with no kids, we take trips with no kids, and we still genuinely love spending time together after almost 20 years.  I'll forever be thankful for that advice I was given.

My daughter and I were at Target today and I was constantly having to ask her to keep up with me and quit lagging behind.  I finally asked her what she was doing and she said "Screaming inside of my head."  I laughed, and assumed I'd exhausted her patience and needed to leave.  It turns out her mosquito bites were super itchy and she was struggling to not scratch her arm off, but what she said has stuck with me all day.  I feel like she described my thoughts about being a stay at home mom perfectly.  Would I trade being able to stay home for anything?  Not a chance, but have there been a million different times where I feel like I'm "screaming inside of my head"?  You bet your ass there have been.  It is just a big fat learning process on how to find balance, and I'm hopeful that I can master that before the kids turn into adults.  

Packing for a Disney Cruise

Our recent cruise on the Disney Magic was absolutely amazing (for help planning check out my Tips for Planning a Disney Cruise post), and a big part of how smooth it went was because I packed almost perfectly.  I am a habitual over packer, so to actually use almost everything I packed was quite the victory for me.  Here are some of my "musts" for your Disney Cruise as well as a list of of what kind of clothes I took for our family.  Keep in mind, we participated in all of the theme nights on the cruise, which I highly recommend doing, even though it does add quite a bit to your suitcases.  Our family of four took two large suitcases, one carry on size suitcase, and each of us had a back pack or bag that we carried on.

1.  Organize and Label the Kid's Outfits
This is where my OCD tendencies really paid off.  There are a lot of things you have to pack, and my kids never keep anything organized once we are on a trip.  I knew our stateroom was pretty small, and the thought of having clothes everywhere made me have a minor panic attack.  I put the kids stuff in ziplock bags and labeled each one with things like "Daytime", "Dinnertime", "Formal Night", "Swimsuits", and put all the matching accessories in each bag.  I kept the clothes in the bags in the drawers in our room so the kids could just grab one and get dressed quickly.  It made checking things off my packing list really easy as well.  We took the used ziplock bags to store wet swim suits or clothes on the port adventures we took.

2.  Storage Containers/Hanging Organizers/Clothespins/Magnetic Hooks
The staterooms are small and space is valuable.  I read a blog recommending that you bring a hanging shoe organizer attached to a hanger (you can't use any over the door type hangers), and this was very helpful!  There was a knob on the wall by the bathroom to hang it on and we kept our cups, kids shoes, sunglasses, and snacks in there.
Ladies, I also highly recommend taking your makeup/toiletries/jewelry in a hanging bag.  I found an awesome one at a local boutique for $7 before our trip and it was perfect.  I hung it on the towel rack in the bathroom.  You have almost no counter space in the bathroom, so a hanging bag is a must.
I also got a fabric pop up storage box at the Dollar Tree and used it on the desk.  We put all our Fish Extender gifts we received (check out FE posts here and here), tickets for port adventures, the kids journals, and anything else that would have cluttered up the desk.
There is a clothesline in the shower and I was so glad someone told me to bring clothespins to hang our swimsuits with!
I used magnetic hooks on the inside of our door to hang our lanyards from.  Oh yeah, bring lanyards too!  They hold your "Key to the World" which gets you in your room, on and off the ship, and is used to charge stuff to your account as well.  I found cute Mickey lanyards at Dollar Tree the day before we left.

3. Over the Counter Medication
One of the ladies from my cruise group mentioned that she packs something for almost any type of situation.  I threw in ibuprofen for kids and adults, Pepto for kids and adults, and kids cold medicine.  I didn't pack Dramamine because I learned that you can get it for free at Guest Services.  The family that we sat with at dinner each night had one of their kids encounter some stomach trouble and went to the staff for some Immodium or Pepto.  They were told he had to see the doctor, and then had his Key to the World deactivated and couldn't leave the ship for 24 hours because he wasn't feeling well.  If they'd brought their own, they wouldn't have had to miss out on one of the ports.

4. Water Bottles or Cups With Lids
This was another idea I got from all the pre-cruise research I did.  There are soda machines (they have water too) available all the time, but they only have small disposable cups.  I brought Tervis cups for each of us to use and one sports water bottle.  They also let you bring your own beer and or wine on the ship, so having a cup to make drinks in our room was really nice.  Make sure you check the Disney Cruise Line website to view their new policy regarding bringing alcohol on the ship.  It has changed since we last sailed.

5. Decorations for Your Stateroom Door
Lots of people decorated their doors and it was really fun to see what everyone did.  The kids loved having our door decorated because they could easily find our room.  You can buy decorations on Etsy, or make your own.  I found some templates and printables on Pinterest to make ours and had so much fun putting together things to show off our family's interests.  You can really do anything you want, they just have to be magnetic because no adhesives are allowed.  I somehow got home without ever taking a picture of our door.  I'll put together the things I made and take a picture and post it soon.

6. Laundry Bag
I didn't ever do laundry on the ship (although you can if you want to), but I found it really helpful to have a bag to put dirty clothes in.  Some things I read said to bring a pop up hamper, but that seemed like it would take up more space.  I got a drawstring laundry bag at Dollar Tree and hung it in the closet in our stateroom.


What kind of clothes to take?!?

I started making my packing list about a month before the trip.  At two weeks out, I started adding things to suitcases.  OCD tendencies aside, I am a professional procrastinator, so to have everything packed so early was nothing short of a miracle.  My husband likes to say "It wouldn't be a vacation unless you were up till 3am packing before we leave."  This trip was the first time I've ever been packed ahead of time and gone to bed at a reasonable hour. I attribute that to researching and knowing exactly what to pack, and also to knowing I'd be on a ship and forgetting things wasn't really an option.  That being said, I forgot to pack myself any pajamas and had to steal things from my husband.

Here is general breakdown of what I packed.  Hopefully this is helpful!

Myself
-Toiletries/Makeup
-Jewelry to match each outfit
-Undergarments
-Casual clothes for each day on the ship
-Casual skirts and dresses for "Cruise Casual" dinners
-Lightweight sweater (only ended up wearing this in theater)
-Knit sundresses for Port Adventure days (our adventures required you to be in your swim suit as soon as you got there, so I just threw a matching dress on over it to wear afterwards)
-Dresses for Formal Night, Semi Formal Night, and our Palo Brunch
-Pirate Costume
-3 Swim suits (this was hard, I usually pack one for each day of a trip!), 2 Cover ups
-Shoes - 1 pair of heels that matched all 3 dressy dresses, 1 pair of nude color sandals, 1 pair of black sandals, 1 pair of flip flops, and the Converse that I wore onto the ship.  Again, so hard!  I usually pack way more shoes
-Sunglasses
-Workout clothes (One of the few things I never wore on the trip)

Kids
-Toiletries
-Swim suits & Swim shirts (3 suits and a cover up for my daughter, 2 suits for my son)
-Casual clothes for each day on the ship
-Casual skirts and dresses for my daughter, and nice shorts and shirts for my son for "Cruise Casual" dinners.  My son could go from day to night in what he wore a lot of times.  I brought separate day and night outfits for my daughter.
-Formal Night outfits (dress for my daughter, slacks/vest/tie for my son)
-Semi Formal Night outfits (dress for my daughter, khaki pants, button down shirt for my son)
-Pirate Costumes
- Shoes - My daughter took 1 pair of flip flops, 1 pair of white sandals, 1 pair of black sandals, water shoes, and the Converse she wore onto the ship.  My son took 1 pair of flip flops, water shoes, 1 pair of canvas boat shoes (for dinners), 1 pair of dress shoes, and the sneakers he wore onto the ship.
-Pajamas
-Sunglasses & hats

My Husband
-Toiletries
-2 Swim suits
-Casual clothes for each day on the ship
-Nice shorts/shirts for "Cruise Casual" dinners
-Formal Night outfit - Slacks, button down shirt, tie
-Semi Formal Night & Palo Brunch outfits - Slacks, button down shirts
-Pirate Costumes
-Shoes - 1 pair flip flops, 1 pair dress shoes, 1 pair running shoes, 1 pair water shoes, and the Converse he wore onto the ship.
-Workout clothes
-Pajamas
-Sunglasses & hat