Surviving Disney World when your kids outnumber you.

For single parents, married parents, and grandparents, if you have one kid, you have it easy! One little person to track, feed, and entertain is a piece of cake. Now add another...two…or three… I can tell your palms are starting to sweat aren’t they? Some things my wonderfully patient and no so patient self have found out, is that you can make it through Walt Disney World, even out-numbered. The secret is… packing.

Big stroller, even if you don’t need one, medium cooler bag, and a few little tricks. We found ourselves looking forward to the time when we do not have to have a stroller in the park for our kids, but we’ve come to the conclusion that we need it. Forever! If you see a couple with a huge jogging type stroller at one of the parks, there’s a good chance it’s us. Truth be told, kids fall asleep.

You have three options: wake them up (moody kids good luck with that!), stroller, or carry them. Just linger there for a moment. Sore feet, sweaty, tired, now carrying dead weight which is also sweating, moody, and hot sounds like a lot of fun doesn’t it? Don’t be afraid of looks from others, bring the darn stroller. They make rugged ones. Even if you kids make it through the park without sleeping use it to carry the jackets, cooler, drinks, purchases, and it makes a great place setting for parades and fireworks. Sit in front of it and you have a buffer for those not so nice viewers who like to push their way forward. Locked wheels are your friend!

Get a zipper type cooler and load it up. Hang it on the stroller handles, in the seat, whatever. Three kids mean three overpriced drinks, three overpriced snacks, and three times the dent to your wallet/purse per few hours. Freeze some water bottles that you can drink once they defrost. Use the frozen bottles as ice to chill the contents of the bag. Milk, water, grapes, veggies, chocolate, 5 hour energy drinks, sandwiches, pickles, all go into the cooler. Start running low on waters, pull out a frozen one and set it in the basket of the stroller that you so intelligently brought. It’s Florida where ice melts even in January.

If you are getting tired of plain water, then bring some Mio, Koolaid packs, or Crystal light packs to mix in the bottles. Flavored water wins with kids. Find yourself a nice shady spot, mix up some flavored water, pull out your turkey sandwich, and give the kids the grapes. Try not to snicker as you see the people in line waiting to spend more cash than they have to on food they probably won’t enjoy.