Meet & Greets with a semi large family

[marcar12]

We will be in WDW with our 4 kids this Oct! Their ages will be 12 (DD), 9 (DD), 5 (DS), and 2.5 (DD). Our younger two are very interested in meet & greets, and the older two are more than happy to come along with them. But when I imagine meeting a character as a group of 6, with 4 kids, it seems like it might be overwhelming, or that not everyone will get a chance to talk much to the character. Is this anything to really be concerned about? Those of you who have done meet and greets with 4 or more kids in your group, how did it go? Any suggestions?

Thanks!

 

[YesterDark]

I don't see why there should be any concern. You really don't talk to the characters much. You walk in, get pictures, the character interact briefly and you move on. The cast members keep it moving pretty fluidly. Character dining gets you a little more time with characters though.

 

[QueenIsabella]

I have 4 kids over an 11-year span. In our experience, the character interactions go fairly quickly--whether you have 1 kid or 6, you're not going to be chatting for more than a minute or two. It's likely that the fce characters will focus on your 5yo, maybe the 9yo--again, IME, toddlers can be wildly unpredictable in meet and greets. A normally gregarious child can become suddenly shy, or the kid that doesn't say three words together becomes a chatterbox--or anywhere in between. The face characters are really good at drawing them out and interacting, but you're still talking a short amount of time. So, who knows what you will get, both from the face character and from your youngest DD.

We did more character meals when my older two were little. It was really sweet--my older son would play "shy boy", offering the visiting princess just enough encouragement that she'd keep trying. He would hide behind his hands, then peek one eye out, maybe flash a dimple, and egg the girls on. He would collect lipstick kisses like most people collect autographs! This is even funnier to us now, when he's a 6-foot tall, surly 21yo.