For the first post in my series about traveling with a baby to Disney, click here! And, for tips on handling air travel with a baby, click here!
Hotel stays can be a lot of fun, but if it’s your first time staying in a hotel with a baby or toddler, it can be a little overwhelming! Luckily, many hotels (especially in the Orlando area) make it very easy to travel with a little one. I’ll be sharing tips for sleeping, feeding, diapering, playing, & bathing – although this is geared towards Disney-owned hotels in the Orlando area, many of these tips and tricks apply to other hotels too! Just make sure to call ahead and ask the front desk for anything you may need.
Note: below each section I included pertinent links to products we have used and found helpful when traveling! I do earn a small commission from purchases made at those links – thank you for supporting our family!
Sleeping Arrangements & Tips
Depending on your room type, you have several options for sleeping arrangements at Disney hotels. First, if you would like a crib or pack & play, make sure to call the resort and request one. They are available on a limited basis. The same is true for bed rails, once the kiddos get a little older. DVC rooms typically have a pack & play already available in one of the closets. Rest assured, Disney provides clean sheets so you don’t have to worry about packing those!
When our son was young enough to be in a pack & play or crib, we tried to find a spot in the room that was relatively quiet and dark so he could sleep. We’ve rolled his pack & play into bathrooms, partially into a closet, etc. As any traveler will tell you, hotels can be a little tight, so we’ve had to get a little creative with where our son’s pack & play goes. When staying in DVC or timeshare units that are 1 bedroom or larger, this isn’t a concern – just put the pack & play in the living portion of the unit.
Once he got older and we could trust him in a real bed, we had no problem having him sleep on his own. He’s never been one to roll off the side of the bed, so we haven’t felt that bed rails were something we needed.
No matter his age – infant or toddler – we have always brought a small white noise machine with us. At home we use our Echo Dot for rain noises every night, but sometimes it can be impractical to set up an Echo device while traveling. Instead, we use a small battery operated device called the Baby Shusher. It works like a charm! For added white noise, if his pack & play is situated near the bathroom, we run the fan overnight. If you don’t have a portable white noise machine and you’re finding yourself in a pinch, check your phone’s app store for a free white noise app, or there are several YouTube videos that play white noise (but be careful about ads randomly interrupting the white noise!).
Our son does have trouble sleeping our first night on vacation, partially due to jet lag, partially due to not doing anything all day on the plane. When we arrive at our destination, we try to keep him as occupied as possible – walking, playing, swimming, etc. After our arrival night, he typically sleeps pretty well, especially at Disney. He’s usually so tuckered out by the end of the day, he sleeps through the night. In fact, this is one of the reasons we don’t take nap breaks at the hotel mid-day. We’d rather wear him out during the day so that he sleeps straight through the night. Again, you know your child best – if your child requires a lot of sleep, midday hotel breaks may be best for you! It just doesn’t work out that great for our family.
If you’re staying at a non-Disney hotel, call to check about availability for pack & plays, cribs, & bed rails. Some hotels offer these, some don’t! Depending on how long you are staying, you may find it worth it to run to Target or Walmart and pick up a cheap pack & play. When visiting family in Texas, we did exactly that, then had them store the pack & play at their house for future visits, or for other family members to use!
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Feeding
Both our kids are formula-fed, so for families who are nursing – adapt these tips as necessary!
We pack all of our bottles with us, and a small cleaning brush. We also bring portable sterilizing bags. These are bags that you just zap in the microwave, and its contents are sterilized, including pump parts! If you are staying in a room that does not have a microwave, the front desk may be able to send one to your room, or you can find one in the food court at value resorts. Additionally, the baby care centers in the parks offer microwaves!
As for our formula, we bring one sealed box of formula in our checked bags. We also bring a large Ziploc bag to put the formula box in when we head home, so that if it were to open, it wouldn’t spill formula powder all over our luggage.
When we arrive, we purchase water bottles so that we can have fresh, clean water to make our bottles with. For stays in DVC rooms that have a full kitchen, we bring our Dr. Brown’s Formula Pitcher, so we can make more than one bottle’s worth at a time, and store it in the refrigerator. We also bring a battery-operated formula mixer so we don’t have any clumps!
As our son has gotten older and no longer needs formula, we bring 2 sippy cups with us for water or milk. On the plane, we bring a TON of snacks, and that’s usually enough to hold him out for the duration of our vacation (seriously that’s how many snacks we pack on the plane!). If we start to run low on snacks, the baby care centers in the parks sell many toddler-friendly treats. We also bring his favorite breakfast food – oatmeal – knowing that we typically have access to a microwave either in our room or somewhere else at the hotel.
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Diapering
Changing a diaper in a hotel isn’t much different than changing a diaper at home. We always lay down a changing pad or towel, and change our child as normal! Of course, you probably don’t want dirty diapers sitting in your hotel trash can. We bring Sassy bags – scented trash bags kind of like dog waste bags – to throw out all our diapers in. Wet diapers go in the normal hotel trash cans, but we take the dirty ones out to trash cans near the parking lot or elsewhere on hotel grounds.
If we happen to run out of diapers or wipes, we can pick up extras at the hotel gift shop or baby care centers. They can also be delivered to your hotel via a grocery delivery service, or you can Uber to a nearby store to pick out what you need.
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Playtime
We don’t bring many toys when we travel, especially to Disney. The toys that we do bring are more for the purposes of keeping our kid occupied on the plane. We find that between the theme parks, a swim in the pool, and sensory overload, he is exhausted by the end of the day, and doesn’t usually need extra entertainment. Hopefully, you’ll find that this is the case too! But if it’s not, bring toys that you or your child won’t be upset about if they go missing or get damaged. A fun book, stuffed animal, and tablet (if they are old enough) could be enough for them! Also, keep in mind you can always pick out a souvenir for them in the theme parks if you really get desperate!
One thing we love to do at Disney Resort hotels is swim! The pools are so fun and there are often Cast Member-led activities near the pools (be sure to check with the Front Desk or Guest Services for further info!). Make sure to bring swim diapers – we like layering a reusable one over a disposable one.
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Bathing
Depending on your resort and room type, you will either have a shower without a tub, or a shower with a tub. Bathing your kiddo in the tub is probably easiest – personally, we don’t carry along any sort of portable bathtub, although that is an option! We have found it easiest to have one parent in the tub with our kiddo to help bathe him.
If your room just has a shower, we have one parent stand and hold our son with both arms, while the other parent helps lather up the baby. We don’t want to risk any slip & falls so we have always erred on the side of caution!
Some days, just a washcloth bath is totally fine – if you are traveling during a colder part of the year (January or February for example) they may not need a full bath!
