Edit: effective early December, Ratatouille has been added to the Epcot extended hours in the evenings. This is a total game changer given how challenging it is to get on that ride. Wish we were there for that! Whew, we did the extended hours in Magic Kingdom last night and it honestly felt like a [...]
Tag: Walt Disney World
Why Genie+ and Lightning Lane Disappointed this Disney Mom
Best Wait Times in Hollywood Studios
Update: by the end of our trip we rode Slinky Dog 4 times, never waiting more than 15 minutes, MMRR twice (20 minutes once, walk on another), ROTR twice (both under 5 minutes), and TSM 4 times as well (typically walking on, although we had one long wait when we tried during the early entry [...]
Giving Lightning Lane and Genie+ a Try
Woohoo! We are back in Disney for our weeklong trip (if you haven’t come in mid-November, do it. Perfect weather, Christmas decorations up, moderate crowds). This is my first experience with the new paid Genie+ system and the paid individual lightning lanes as well, so I figure throughout the week I’ll write up some feedback/reviews. [...]
New annual passes 9/8
I haven’t had a chance to peruse the internet this morning, but the recording when you call DVC Member Services was updated to say “new annual pass sales will resume September 8th” this morning. Seems like big news, so I imagine it has been announced elsewhere as well, but in case it hasn’t, there ya [...]
Tickets for “Disney’s Very Merriest After Hours”

Update: see screenshots at the end for prices and dates. Today I received an unexpected email announcing that I would be able to purchase tickets for something called "Disney's Very Merriest After Hours" starting August 17th. This purchase date seems to be based on the fact that I have a resort reservation during the holiday [...]
Booking System Issues and Sudden Availability

This morning (8/9/21) there was a surprising flood of availability for hard-to-get dates at nearly every DVC resort. When poking around just before 7am, instead of seeing the typical 1 or 2 nights available in a studio across any resort for the months of November and December, I saw full availability for weeks like “Jersey [...]
Remy Previews!
As my kiddo said today… “you know what’s exciting? The Ratatouille ride is opening!!” As has been conveyed by various media outlets/blogs, previews for Remy’s ride were announced and invites were sent today! The previews are for Annual Passholders and DVC members. This is the first big ride opening that I’ve been a member of [...]
Direct vs Resale DVC Points
If you are new to hearing about Disney Vacation Club memberships, you are probably wondering what it means when people refer to points/contracts as being Direct or Resale. So as a follow up to my post linked below regarding the up front cost of purchasing a Disney Vacation Club Membership in general, it is important [...]
Current Firework Status in Walt Disney World
"But there are no fireworks!" has been a frequent complaint across the social media world and real-life world when planning a potential trip to Walt Disney World gets discussed. It seems no one can imagine the Most Magical Place on Earth without nightly fireworks, which is fair. Part of Disney's magic is that every day [...]