Kingdom Keepers Quest brings novels to life at Magic Kingdom – A Mom and The Mouse – Orlando Sentinel

UPDATE: Registration begins in early June for the start of the program in the fall.
The Disney Youth Programs division has brought to life the popular Kingdom Keepers novels by Ridley Pearson with an educational challenge in the Magic Kingdom. Kingdom Keepers Quest is a self-guided tour through the Disney World theme park in search of clues to save the magic.
The quest is designed for kids 10 to 12 years old, but is not limited to those ages. Typically, groups of five students and a leader tackle the challenge together, solving puzzles and testing math and language arts skills as they move from attraction to attraction. Each student receives a unique map, and the group has a workbook and a leader guide.
The length of time for Kingdom Keepers Quest varies because it is a self-guided tour, but it could be completed in 3 to 4 hours if started in the morning, said Sarah Domenech, a Disney public relations manager.
“One of the most potent added values of Kingdom Keepers Quest is that it puts the action of literacy back on the ground. Students are able to take a book and live it.,” Pearson said. “Creativity doesn’t come from reading a book or taking a class, it comes from going out and living every day and looking around you. By taking this program, kids will learn to observe, work as a team, take new ideas and process them in new ways, and bring them back into the classroom.”
Quest tickets for Florida residents are $53 plus tax, which includes that day’s admission to Magic Kingdom with a non-park hopper ticket. (There is not a separate price for passholders.) Rates for those living outside Florida depend on the type of ticket purchased and begin at $124 for a three-day base ticket. A minimum of 10 students is required to book the program.
Because this is a self-guided tour, groups may choose the time and day to start, within Magic Kingdom daily operating hours, of course. To register, call 877-939-6884.
Pearson debuted “Kingdom Keepers IV: Power Play” at Downtown Disney last month with a book-signing event. Read what that experience was like here.

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What You Do To Protect Your Kids While at Walt Disney World?

Here are some suggestions from parents on DISboards.com:

We always go to the bathroom with our kids, never let them go alone.

We also never allow the kids in any of the resort elevators alone.

Any ride or show the kids sit between adults. (room permitted)

Any dark pre-show (HISTA, Ellen) we hold hands so we always know where they are at.

In waiting lines we always have the girls between us.

We take their pic each morning so we know what they were wearing in case of them getting lost.

Oldest carries a cell phone to call us if we get seperated.

Orlando Sentinel - More parents feed their kids apples instead of fries at Disney parks on Tourism Central Florida

Whether by default or by choice, it appears Disney’s theme-park guests are opting to feed their kids healthier foods while eating in the parks.

Since Disney’s theme-park restaurants in 2006 overhauled their kids-meal menus to make healthier dishes the default selection for both side orders (ie: apple slices instead of French fries) and drinks (milk instead of soft drinks), Disney says the majority of its guests are picking the nutritious options.

According to company data, 65 percent of guests at Walt Disney World and Disneyland ordered the healthier side dish and 68 percent ordered the healthier drink last year during Disney’s fiscal fourth quarter, which runs July through September.

Guests at Disney’s international parks were even more nutritious. In Hong Kong, 98 percent chose the healthier side and 96 percent chose the healthier drink. And in Paris, 85 percent chose the healthier drink – though just 15 percent picked the healthier side.

The data were culled from 485 Disney-operated restaurants.

Orlando Sentinel - More parents feed their kids apples instead of fries at Disney parks on Tourism Central Florida

So, what do you order for your kids when you are at Disney? I'd say it's about 50/50 for us. I think it's partly the hot weather, the lack of variety for kids, and a need for fiber in their diet (our kids seem to have trouble with regularity when traveling) rather than "healthy" per se. I can't say we worry about being healthy all that much when we are on vacation.

Christmas fun

I came across a couple of things at Disney's Family.com web site worth passing along. The first is another personalize video creator similar to the one being used to promote next year's "What will you celebrate?" theme at Disney. In this case, you can create a personalized video with Santa, including a picture of your child (or whomever). You can view the one I created and create your own by going to http://family.go.com/santas-list/video/42302-raccoontrails/

The second item that I've really enjoyed are the "Scared of Santa" pictures. These are absolutely hysterical. One of my favorites so far is this one.

Enjoy and Merry Christmas!

Disney World with toddlers, Where to Stay?

I came across this article to day about where to stay when visiting Disney World with toddlers. Having done this several times, I was curious about what the author would recommend. Their only recommendation was to stay on-site. Why? Because of the convenience factor.

Wow! I was shocked by that because it is so contrary to our own experience. We found that the sprawling resorts were difficult for toddlers unless you take your stroller everywhere not to mention waiting in line for buses. The last thing my kids wanted to do was walk more and wait in more lines. I honestly just don't understand why everybody finds driving to Disney so difficult. Granted it costs $12/day but you save more than that staying off-site. Our experience has been that it's much easier to get in our car and drive than wait in line, try to find seats on the bus and go from stop-to-stop before getting where we actually wanted to go.

Aside from those factors, we found that having to go to the food court to eat breakfast was a huge time sink. Also, going to the pool was a whole involved process of getting everybody ready, walking (again) to the main pool which was often crowded with older kids who disregarded our toddlers. Contrast that to staying in a nearby pool house. Everybody has their own room, you can eat a normal relaxed breakfast, going to the pool means stepping outside.

I guess I just don't get it.

Young Chef's Program

Walt Disney World Junior Chefs

Youngsters get a taste of what it’s like behind the scenes in the Walt Disney World Junior Chef Program. In both quick-service and full-service eateries, young guests are randomly selected every day to don a toque and white jacket and help decorate a cake or cookies, or toss a salad for their own family’s meal. Though the children are not permitted in the kitchens, the chefs give them a quick and fun culinary lesson, with guests often gathered round to watch.

For instance, at Boma-Flavors of Africa restaurant at Disney’s Animal Kingdom Lodge, cultural representatives from Africa select children to participate. A Boma chef comes to the table and escorts the child to the restaurant’s on-stage bakery to make a dessert to share with their family. Each participant gets a photo and a certificate signed by the chef.

Fun With Food at Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort & Spa

When mom and dad are ready for a break, Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort & Spa offers guests two culinary programs for kids: The Wonderland Tea Party and Grand Adventures in Cooking.

The Wonderland Tea Party is an hour-long, kids-only celebration with Alice and the Mad Hatter from the animated film classic. Up to 24 children ages 3 to 10 gather at one long, linen-covered table to decorate cupcakes (with their fingers) and dine on heart-shaped peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches and apple juice “tea.” Alice and the Mad Hatter join the fun and play games like “Hatter Says” with the children. The party ends with the children gathering fresh flowers that decorate the table to tie into bouquets to give their parents. Cost is $24.95 per child.

Grand Adventures in Cooking lets children make a dessert, then share it with Grand Floridian guests. The cooking program for ages 3 to 10 is limited to 12 young chefs, who start the two-hour session by painting their chef aprons with colorful handprints. As the aprons dry, children hear a story themed to the dessert they will prepare, with nearly a dozen dessert-and-story choices in the repertoire. For strawberry shortcake, for instance, the children assemble already-made cake with fresh berries and whipped cream, then head to the lobby in toques and aprons to offer the treats to guests. On an average day, the kids will make 100 strawberry shortcakes, 10 dozen cookies or nine pounds of fudge. Cost is $19.95 per child.

Create your own Magic Kingdom fireworks show

If your kids are like mine, they will love playing with this on-line game which allows you to shoot fireworks over Cinderella castle. You just click where you want the fireworks to go off. You can keep clicking to create a grand finale type explosion of color.

Top Downtime Ideas

If you go to Disney World with young kids then you will probably need to find ways to have some downtime (even if they don't). We have usually gone back to our hotel or rental house for downtime when our kids were very young, but as they have gotten older we have started using more in-the-park relaxation techniques. Here are some of our favorite places to get away from it all with out ever leaving:

• Spaceship Earth (Epcot) It's cool, dark and the line moves quickly. I haven't seen the new version yet, it was still closed when we were there last time, but I actually liked the old version.
  
• The Boneyard (DinoLand USA - Animal Kingdom) & Honey, I Shrunk the Kids Playground - (Hollywood Studios) Our kids would probably stay and play at either of these playgrounds as long as we let them. There's only one way in/out so as long as we position ourselves at the exit we don't have to worry about them escaping. They both have water elements to cool them off on especially hot days, too.
  
• Various play fountains (outside Ariel's Grotto, Magic Kingdom & Fast Track, Epcot, Tiki drums/Spitting Camels in Adventureland) We've found these to be nice, quick breaks that really perk up the kids. We make sure they take off their socks and shoes so they won't get blisters, but otherwise let them get as wet as they want. It really revives them on a hot day.
  
• Tomorrowland Transit Authority (Magic Kingdom) Let's just say if we had one of these at home we wouldn't have a problem getting the kids to sleep at night.
  
• Walt Disney World Railroad (Magic Kingdom) We like to take the train when we're at the back of the park and when everybody is tired. It's not a fast way to get around, but it's a good way to take a break and still get somewhere.
  
• Gran Fiesta Tour (Mexico Exhibit, Epcot) OK, the changes to the attraction are a cultural hack, but still there is never a line and it's cool and dark and you get to sit down.
  
• Ellen's Energy Adventure (Epcot) This ride has a number of things going for it. If you can get past the sometimes long wait where there's no place to sit...you get to sit for a long time, in air conditioning. Plus there's Ellen and dinosaurs.
• Monorail - I know it's not actually an attraction per se but it's one of my kids' favorite rides. Especially given the "secret" things you can do. First, ask to ride up front. I'm always surprised how many people don't know about this. Second, collect the monorail trading cards. We still don't have the black one.
• Shop - Take some time to enjoy some of the specialty shops and get in out of the heat.
• Stroll - Imagineers put a lot of time into small details in obscure corners. It's fun to take time to wander around without rushing somewhere and just enjoy looking at some of the small things. We've found some fun stuff this way.
• Snack - Stop to get an ice cream, Dole whip, frozen lemonade or whatever your fancy is. Actually stop to get it. Enjoy it. Watch people rushing by trying to get wherever they are going and enjoy taking your time.
  

First Disney Trip? Plan? What Plan?

I finally convinced a friend of mine that he needed to take his family to Disney World. Granted he's going down for conference anyway and he is grudgingly admitting that his youngest son would enjoy it. I'm more excited than he is. He's not a first timer. Far from it. He used to work at Disney World back when the only park was the Magic Kingdom. I think it kind of soured him on the place.

"So," I said to him, "I've got good touring book you can borrow and several web sites I can recommend that will help you figure out which parks to visit on which days! Let me know which characters your son likes and I can help you find some character meals and figure out which restaurants you might like to go to. You know you'll need to start thinking about that now don't you?" "Whoa! This sounds way too complicated." he said.

The fact of the matter is part of the enjoyment of the trip for me is the planning of the trip. The vast majority of visitors to Disney go without planning things out and they enjoy themselves, too. I believe that planning can provide opportunity for additional enjoyment because it can reduce stress in the parks by avoiding the worst crowds, minimizing wait times, making sure you have reservations for the restaurants you really want, having the knowledge about less known attractions and things to look for, etc. Not to mention the fact that you can sometimes save money by knowing all your options.

So if you are planner where should you start? You can get a wealth of information from the Internet in scattered form, but your best bet is to get a tour book. There are several very good books. Go to a book store and look through them to see which one you like best. My favorite is Disney World with Kids by Kim Wright Wiley. It's geared toward going with kids, obviously, but is quite useful for general information. The other book that I would highly recommend is The Unofficial Guide. With the purchase of the book, you get access to their web site which has a wealth of planning information such as their crowd calendar which predicts how crowded each park will be on a given day.

Sandcastle kids club review

As I mentioned in a previous post, on our last trip my wife made the decision to stay in a single room at Port Orleans rather than get a suite at the All-Star Music resort. Our thinking was that we would rather save the money and would prefer the more upscale accommodations and resort. In addition, we decided that we would rather have a night out by ourselves by applying the savings toward paying for one of the kids clubs for our 3 kids.

Being a meticulous planner, I realize that the various in-room babysitting services are more affordable for 3 kids but we decided that the kids would enjoy going to one of the kids clubs more than an in-room service. Since it's their vacation, too, we felt that this was a good compromise. Although it's quite a bit more expensive than in-room we figured they would enjoy it a lot more and my wife was more comfortable, especially since we were able to arrange for dinner at EPCOT which is very close to the Sandcastle club. However, if you are interested in the in-room services here are the two that I've heard the most about:

Fairy Godmothers
(407) 275-7326

and

Kid's Nite Out
1-800-696-8105


At first our middle daughter, Laura, was nervous about going. Although 8 at the time, she is the most tentative of the 3. We really talked it up and our older daughter, Elizabeth (9) and youngest son Gabriel (4) were eager to go. I had pictured a bustling room filled with kids, but when we arrived, our kids were the only ones there. That suited them fine. They were excited to check out each room. They found princess dresses (for the girls), video games, and toys galore. Dinner with all the standard Disney kid options such as mac-n-cheese, hot dogs, french fries, etc. was included. It amazes me how many times my kids can each mac-n-cheese in a week and not get tired of it.

We were given a beeper in case of an emergency, which really made us feel much better (our 4 year old can be pill sometimes). We left for our dinner at Chefs de France and had a wonderful time. When we came back several hours later the kids begged us to let them stay for a little while longer! It turned out to one of their favorite things on the entire trip. It ended up costing a grand total of $66 ($33/hour). We were actually gone for a little more than 2 hours, but they didn't charge us for the extra time. In our opinion it was money well spent.

Several things that worked well for us:

• Choose a club that is close to where you are going to spend the evening. This cuts down on the time you waste in trasportation as well as peace of mind. Ask the cast member to help you choose the best kids club when you call to make reservations.
• Make reservations! Call 407-WDW-DINE. You have to make reservations for the kids clubs just like you have to make reservations for dinner. Make sure you can get reservations for both at the same time.
• Talk it up to your kids. Let them know that it's a special treat for them, too. It's not just dumping them off somewhere while you go off to have fun (even though that's kind of what you are doing!) The kids clubs are really set up to be a kid paradise. I understand some kids just won't like being away from their parents and you'll have to judge that, but the vast majority of kids will be in heaven.
  

Can my child handle Expedition Everest?

I came across this question on a forum and thought I'd share my experience. I have 3 kids - 2 girls and a boy. My girls are 15 months apart followed by my son who is 3 years younger. On our first trip where the girls were tall enough to ride nearly all the rides, I wanted to encourage them to ride as many rides as possible but I didn't want to force them to ride anything. Neither of them were what I would call "thrill seekers." Neither of them had ever ridden a roller coaster before and they were both nervous about the thrill rides. My wife and I both love thrill rides and played them up.

I adopted a strategy of working from least adventurous rides to more adventurous as the trip progressed. The first "roller coaster" we did was Goofy's barn stormer. Once they realized they could live through that, we did Pirates of the Carribean. Then we did Big Thunder Mountain followed by Splash Mountain. By then end of the two weeks they were brave enough to ride Rockin' Roller Coaster and Tower of Terror.

By starting with the easy rides it not only gave them the confidence they needed to try something a little scarier it helped my judge whether they could handle something a little harder. For instance, on our last trip down my son, who was 4 at the time went on Splash Mountain. He was basically petrified after the drop. I could tell that was his limit. Two day later he was begging me to let him go on ToT, but I could tell from the way he had stopped breathing for about a minute and half on Splash Mountain that ToT was going to be a bad experience for him at this point. So we decided to wait for a while.

Walt Disney World with Kids

I came across a post on a discussion board asking if a 2 year old would have fun at Disney World. It's hard for me to realize that a lot of people have never been to Disney World and just have no idea what to expect. Most of my life I had gone to Disney without kids, so once I became a parent I realized I was entering uncharted waters. I decided to do some research and found a book that I've ended up using on return trips and recommending over and over.

Walt Disney World with Kids by Kim Wright Wiley has a wealth of up-to-date and insightful information that is spot on. She gives advice about which rides are likely to scare kids and which are not rather than just which ones they can get on based on height.

In addition to that book, the biggest thing I've learned is to take Disney at your kids pace. We always treat our Disney vacation with the thought that we will be coming back again. That removes the "this is a once in a lifetime trip so we we have to see everything" pressure. Although we are NOT morning people we took Kim's advice to heart and we get to the parks early. We usually leave in the early afternoon and retreat back to our accommodations to relax. We return in the evening. This does a number of things for us. First we avoid the worst of the crowds and heat. Second, it gives the kids (and us) a chance to rest both physically and mentally. Disney is exhausting mentally because of the sensory overload that is thrown at you constantly. Finally, it saves us money because we can eat outside the parks. The other thing we do is we break up our days at the park. If we are spending a week at Disney, then we'll probably only go to the parks for 4 days and spend 3 days at the resort or house. Better yet, we'll do like we did a couple of years ago and go for 2 weeks and just go to the parks every other day.

We've found that giving the kids time to enjoy things along the way is more fun that the death-march of trying to get in as many rides as possible. The kids enjoy the playgrounds at the parks as much or more than most of the rides. When the lines get long, let the kids play.

Another thing we have found is to find something they enjoy doing throughout the week. For our girls, this was getting autographs. However, our son wasn't the least bit interested in autographs when he was the same age. For him it was "squishing pennies." To be honest, getting autographs was cheaper, but it takes more time. We had to limit him to one or two penny squishes a day, but it really gave him something to look forward to and was a useful tool when he started to get bored during a long wait.