Disney planning timeline question

[bnme]

We are planning a trip for Dec 2012

Does any one know off-hand when the park schedule for Dec will be released? And when Xmas party tickets will go on sale? And when my reservation window will open?

I don't remember from last time I planned a trip how I coordinated all of this. And we may be on the dining plan (due to others in our group being on it) so I feel like I need to know the park schedule before picking restaurants, but I am not sure how the timing works.

TIA!

[hellokitty]

Well, if it is anytime during the wk leading up to xmas or btwn xmas and new yrs, don't count on the opening schedule staying what it is when they release the crowd schedule. Several of the days we went during our Dec 17-23 stay were switched to EMH a few wks before we went on our trip and it totally screwed up our bkfst ADRs which ended up being at the same time as the parks opened, due to WDW changing up the hrs. That also screwed up our touring, since those particular days ended up being busier than originally predicted.

[KHF]

what hellokitty said. We were at Disney the week before she was this year (Dec. 11-17). They did alter the opening hours some on us too. We ended up shuffling around our schedule a bit while we were there. (Glad we did too, because we ended up at Ohana for breakfast because of it and it was awesome!)

Our ADR date was sometime in June, I believe. If you booked through DIsney, when you log in to their site to look at ressies, it will tell you when your ADR date is.

[Tinkerbell313]

Tickets for MVMCP went on sale May, 1 2011 for November/December 2011 party dates. I know the Dec. 18th party actually sold out sometime in October. I am not sure if any other party sold out.

Your ADR booking window is 180 days (generally about 6 months) prior to your 1st day of arrival. If you are staying at a Disney resort, you can make ADRS 10 days out.

The hours for the parks should be available about 1 month prior to that 180 days. It might be available 2 months before...but definitely 1 month before. As others have mentioned, just monitor the hours as they may change.

[bnme]

Thanks! For some reason I was thinking that park hours were not going to be available until way after my ADR window opened, so this is good news. I guess this means I should wait till closer to May to start planning.

We are going the first week of Dec so hopefully there won't be too much switching. I have never encountered that before, or if it happened we didn't even notice.

I am hoping my family decides not to do the dining plan. The new 2012 prices make not such a great bargain for us, even with doing several table service restaurants. I just hate the thought of having to book so many ressies.

[belovedgandp]

We went the week before Thanksgiving this year. I did my planning at the 6 1/2 month mark for dining reservations and such. A couple of park hours changed on us; a little longer at Epcot and MK but not the dates of EMH.

The only big change that I didn't catch until too late was our day at DHS was picked to see Fantasmic. Originally only going to be 2 of the 5 nights we were there. It ended up being every night EXCEPT the night that we were there. But it made the rest of our day there great, so it worked out in the end.