We are back home
Very successful fourth Jersey Week trip using CL FPs for the second year, while staying at Dolphin. Did not contact DSS once after original booking. As crazy as I am, I never once changed our FPs! Stalking ADRs was another story!
We did a ton of park hopping and it was so nice to have our itinerary set up so perfectly. Due to a glitch when booking the CL FPs, my kids each ended with 3 extra FPs per day. So on some days, they literally had 9 FPs to use and we couldn't even use all of them due to their ages.
Here's how we did it:
MK day/HS night - we had 3 regular FPs and 2 CL FPs booked at MK. we started with Space during EMH hour and fit in some small Fantasyland rides, then moved through all the FPs with lunch in between (PP, 7D, HM, Big Thunder, Splash). We had time to fit in Tom Sawyer's Island, Treehouse, Monsters Inc and People Mover before heading to HS at 4:00. Then easily hopped to HS where we had dinner at Sci Fi, walked through SWGE and shopped, took pictures and had Blue Milk, on to TSL with FP Aliens for the kids with their extra one, SDD CL, and F! as a 4th FP. We did eventually cancel F! due to rain and did standby ToT at the end of the night. Such a perfect day.
AK/EP day - first off, we didn't rope drop. Everyone appreciated sleeping in. EE, Safari, FoP - all with Regular FPs, Dinosaur with kids extra FP (I didn't ride EE, so I rode with them). Then hopped to Epcot to enjoy F&W and saunter to Frozen, TT and Soarin all with CL FPs. Again, perfect day.
HS day/MK night - again, didn't rope drop. Felt nice to not fight the rope drop crowds during an EMH opening morning at HS. We chose to enter around 9:30 to also let the regular opening crowds dissipate. We walked right in. RnR, SDD, TSMM with CL FPs - lunch - Skyliner to EP for more food and wine (did this on a whim!). Monorail to MK to finish up the trip and had tons of regular FPs there due me and hubby splitting up to ride with the kids extras. We had Pirates, Splash, 7D, Space, 7D all with FPs, fit in Barnstormer and Small World and also watched HEA. MK did extend hours this night while we were in the park (probably due to crowds and/or the Holiday Filming).
The program is not cheap, but we cut back in other areas such as sit down meals and dessert parties. I do see though, that my kids now don't handle waits well. The program has spoiled them for sure.
Now the worry sets in if this program will still be running on our next trip which will be early December 2020!