OT: Disney 2016 Trip

What I learned from taking a 1 year old a 3 year old and a 5 year old girl to Disney World Magic Kingdom. We had a family trip planned to Jacksonville FL for my wife and her work and decided that we needed to take the girls to Disney because it's about making memories with the family. A little backstory on that, my neighbor, a retired FBI agent, suddenly had a massive heart attack on the golf course one day and died, leaving behind his wife with dementia and young and new grandkids. My wife and I decided that not spending money to not make new memories was no longer an option, you never know when it may be the last chance you have.
When buying tickets to Disney now they have "Tiers" of days: Peak (highest priced), Regular, and value. Pay attention to when you will be there and what the prices are, moving your trip by a day or two can add up in savings. Also get the Disney Magic Bands:

These bands are the best thing you can buy to make your time inside the park easier. You load your ticket onto the bands, you can load credit cards to the bands and best thing, fastpass is now on the bands. The way fastpass works now is you get 3 fast passes per person to use to get to the head or nearly at the head of the line for rides, shows and meeting characters, Once you have either used all three fast passes or the time for the last one has passed you can add another fast pass off the Disney App. and keep doing this until the night is over. For our trip we added fast passes to meet princess, and ride some rides to start and then just kept added more fast passes, even riding some rides back to back time slots.
So back to the trip. Ill skip the drive from Jacksonville to Orlando except to say I-4 is a mess with construction. Upon arrival at the park we paid for the premium parking, its 35 dollars and if you have a large party or kids I recommend this, you are only a few rows back from the monorail station, it's an easy walk up.
For things to bring: Disney unlike many parks allows, water, food and many other things inside. Also every food service place inside Disney will give you ice water for free if you ask. We also brought bottles of water for all of us, snacks for the kids and even some food for us.
If you want to stay for the light parade and then the fireworks but want to leave soon after I recommend sitting in the town square right near the entrance/exit, there are bathrooms in restaurant right in the square and while you wait you can get your kids Mickey Ears hat embroidered with their name.
This trip was great, not because my wife and I got to do the things we like at Disney but because I got to enjoy seeing my kids enjoy one of the happiest places on earth.

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I can imagine no more rewarding a career. And any man who may be asked in this century what he did to make his life worthwhile, I think can respond with a good deal of pride and satisfaction:
β€œI served in the United States Navy"

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Outspoken team cake advocate. Hates terrapins. Resident Macho Man Gif Poster. Distant cousin to Dork Magic. Frequently misspells words.

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Wet stuff on the red stuff.

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Outspoken team cake advocate. Hates terrapins. Resident Macho Man Gif Poster. Distant cousin to Dork Magic. Frequently misspells words.

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"We judge ourselves by our intentions and others by their behavior" Stephen M.R. Covey

β€œWhen life knocks you down plan to land on your back, because if you can look up, you can get up, if you fall flat on your face it can kill your spirit” David Wilson

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Sometimes we live no particular way but our own

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Wet stuff on the red stuff.

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West Virginian by birth, Hokie by choice

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I have no idea why my username is VT_Warthog.

Arkansas blew a 24-0 lead in the Belk Bowl.

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Wet stuff on the red stuff.

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"We judge ourselves by our intentions and others by their behavior" Stephen M.R. Covey

β€œWhen life knocks you down plan to land on your back, because if you can look up, you can get up, if you fall flat on your face it can kill your spirit” David Wilson

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β€œYou got one guy going boom, one guy going whack, and one guy not getting in the endzone.”
― John Madden (describing VT's offense?)

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Wet stuff on the red stuff.

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β€œYou got one guy going boom, one guy going whack, and one guy not getting in the endzone.”
― John Madden (describing VT's offense?)

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β€œYou got one guy going boom, one guy going whack, and one guy not getting in the endzone.”
― John Madden (describing VT's offense?)

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Wet stuff on the red stuff.

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Warning: this post occasionally contains strong language (which may be unsuitable for children), unusual humor (which may be unsuitable for adults), and advanced mathematics (which may be unsuitable for liberal-arts majors)..

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My wife takes the kids and leaves the house while I watch my Hokie games.........nuff said

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Wet stuff on the red stuff.

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