Planning

It's been a while since I participated in Wordless Wednesday which now is Wordful or Wordless - which is a good thing since I do like to use a lot of words! 
This week's theme is planning, which for me has changed quite a bit over the years. At one time it including travel plans, as well as lodging in Florida and ticket purchases. Occasionally it included dining reservations which often meant that we had to figure out which park we wanted to go to on each day of our trip. As time went on, however, the situation changed. In 1999 my son took part in the Disney College Program in Walt Disney World, followed in 2000 by my daughter. While my son came back home, my daughter never did - as was planned - and we found ourselves visiting WDW much more often which changed how we "did" the parks. No longer did we feel that we had to see everything or do everything. We would go to the parks late and (most often) leave early. We still had to plan on getting a room (which I usually left to my daughter to arrange) and possibly one or two dining (or dinner show) reservations, but more and more as the years went on it became much more open and spontaneous - even with the advent of Fastpass and Fastpass +.
Then a major change occurred and we became snowbirds. Our house in Florida is not in the Orlando area, but it's only about an hour's drive to WDW, so our visits became even less planned. Often I would get up in the morning and decided to drive over for the day. I might make a dining reservation - or not ... I don't usually eat at the "normal" meal times so getting a walk-in is almost always possible. I might make a few Fastpasses if something interests me ... or wait on standby ... or perhaps not even do any attractions on that particular day.
But the biggest change has been the birth of my granddaughter in 2015. When I used to watch my grandsons in NY when they were very young, my wife and I would take them to to local playground for the day. We do the same thing for our granddaughter, however the local playgrounds are named, Magic Kingdom, EPCOT, Disney's Hollywood Studios and Disney's Animal Kingdom. Ask her what she wants to do on any particular day and she will tell you, "Go to Disney World", and we do!
Planning for these trips usually amounts to seeing what "Brooke friendly" attractions have available Fastpasses including character meet and greets. She has just recently gotten her first autograph book and really enjoys meeting the characters and getting her book signed. 
And while she is just now becoming familiar with the princesses and other face characters, since she was just a few months old, she has been meeting the classic Disney (fur) characters with enthusiasm! That's not to say that she doesn't like the rides as well. She is just reaching the height where she can get onto some of the more active attractions - and she does appear to be happiest on the more daring rides. 
So today a visit to a Disney park is different than it was a number of years ago, and the planning has changed quite a bit for us ... as has what a day in the park looks like.