I am looking for some tips on making late dining successful with a small child. DH and I are taking our kids to WDW for the 1st time and we are going during the free dining promotion. Great deal however we were late to reserve this trip so many good dining times were booked up and I have had to settle for a few 8-8:30 PM dining times. This is MUCH later than we usually eat (5 or 6 PM at home). My dds are 6 and 23 mos- am I courting disaster here? Has anyone had a similar experience they can share or any honest thoughts or pointers to offer to make this trip successful for all of us?

For those of you familiar w/ WDW the late ressies are at the following places: Cinderellas Royal table (8:10 PM), Ohanas (8:25 PM) and Whispering Canyon Cafe (8:10 PM).

Snacks,.......and plenty of them....kids won't fall over from malnutrition for a vacation of 'messed up meal times' and unbalanced meals....so to speak....if you can use your snack coupons I'd feed the kids a 'hearty' snack at your normal meal time and not worry too much about them eating a real meal at the resservation/meal time. If you're eating "free" then it's a lot easier to go with the flow than if you're shelling out hard cash for that late dinner...but that's just me.

This is MUCH later than we usually eat (5 or 6 PM at home). My dds are 6 and 23 mos- am I courting disaster here? Has anyone had a similar experience they can share or any honest thoughts or pointers to offer to make this trip successful for all of us?

The time change may work in your favor here, IF you sort of adjust your entire schedule, not just dinner.

When my DS was 2 we went to a family wedding in a time zone 2 hours ahead of us. He was the only child and the family didn't adjust from "adult time" - ie wake up later than 7 am, eat dinner later than 6 pm, etc. Fortunately, his biological clock never adjusted. So when we ate dinner at 8, it was "6" for our son. The key was that we 'let' him sleep in. We didn't set the alarm too early. As long as he was going to bed two hours "later" and waking up two hours "later", eating meals 2 hours later worked, too.

Adrienne

Last year when I called to book all of my ADRs and kept requesting the latest dinner times, the CM started chuckling and said, "you must be from the West Coast, huh?" It worked out well for us, and Max was only 3-years-old at the time. We wanted to do a lot of our dinners after leaving the parks for the day and before heading back to our hotel. We were wiped out every single night, but we got up early and started again every single day. IMO it's a lot worse having early breakfast ADRs because when you call and make an ADR for 8am it doesn't sound too bad, but the thought of actually getting up and then eating around 5am our time is not pleasant. We did a couple of early ones anyway, but not every day.

This year we have a few more days and we don't feel as commando as we did last year (we weren't sure if that would be our only trip to WDW or not, it was our first). So we have made more time for afternoon breaks and dinners in the middle of the evening - I'm hoping it will be a nice downtime, enough to be refreshed for a few more hours of fun.

MammaSilva, you are so right about snacks. My oldest dd is one of those picky eater kids and I have spent many a DL trip feeding her homemade PB&J's and granola bars from the bottom of other dds diaper bag. My dh and I usually just grabbed something from a counter service place for ourselves. This worked great as we could address her hunger/ crankiness on the spot and not really have to deal with dining lines untill we were hungry. I think I will still use this strategy, even with all the table service credits.

Adriennek and Wendi- You're both right, the time change could help, at least in the beginning. My concern is that I love being at the parks at opening and if I try to keep us on pacific time that means 8am EEs will feel like 5 am :( . I am planning on breaks EVERY day however so maybe that will help too.

Part of the problem is we generally do not eat at a lot of table service restaurants while in DL. Other than Goofy's Kitchen for bfst, Blue Bayou and Mimi's Cafe on Harbor (which I consider to be part of DL too!) we generally have not devoted a lot of time to dining at the parks. Now my kids are not complete savages and do have decent table manners (at least for the under 7 age group) , I am just afraid that they may go out the window after an exhausting day at the parks. Truthfully, even at home, I rarely take my kids to sit down meals, as I find I am a little on edge about how they will behave and don't enjoy my meal. This is totally my issue, I know, and I have tried to chose fun dining places at WDW that have a lot of activity going on so there will be less pressure on them and me.

We found that the later times actually work out rather well. We tend to eat a larger breakfast, snack mid-day and then we are good and hungry by the time dinner comes around. When using the dining option, you can eat like a king/queen at dinner and make it even more worth it.

In essence, we try not to think about meals at meal times - we just go with the flow. When we are hungry, we eat. That way we tend not to have the larger, more time consuming meals during the times when we want to be at the parks.

Start late(r) in the morning, so you can make your afternoon break later. Stretch the afternoon break so that you have down time and then a nap - end the nap close to the time you need to leave for your reservations. That way, they will be good and rested.

As far as the behavior thing - we have always found that if our kids are bored, hungry, or tired, behavior is out the window. So, we combat tired by keeping them as well rested as possible. Hungry, by bringing little snacks they can munch on while waiting. Bored - we bring a toy or book or a new toy they haven't seen. Anything to keep them occupied.

At Ohana's, they will have activities your kids can participate in, so at least they shouldn't be bored. Also, the food starts coming pretty much right away.

You'll have fun!