Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party
We just returned from Walt Disney World and attended the first Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party in two years. And it was fantastic. It was a very wet party but we did not let that stop us from having a fantastic time!
My daughter and I were on her solo trip to Walt Disney World, so I planned the Christmas Party around what she wanted to do.
When you are done reading this post head over to my blog post that helps you plan how to execute the Christmas Party for your family.
We are here to give you all the details!
When you enter Mickey’s Very Merry Christas party, you’ll be ushered to the gates on the right side of the park for entrance starting at 4 PM. You will see cast members with signs. Once you enter the park, you will be met with cast members with wristbands for you to put on to identify you are there to attend the party.
Once you get to Main Street around the Town Square area, you’ll see a big truck that says Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party with an arrow pointing to the right. That is where you’ll see cast members handing out Maps and Ornaments as a keepsake. You will want to grab a map because that map is your KEY to where everything is located during the Christmas party.
Things to Know:
If you have a Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party, you do not need a park ticket or reservation for that day. The party ticket allows you to enter the park before the party at 4 PM.
My advice for attending Christmas parties, especially for children, is not to go to the parks that day. If you have children that are ten and under and cannot hang until fireworks on a typical park day, it’s never a good idea to have a full park day and then attend an after hours party. What we do is have a pool morning, relax in the afternoon, we eat a huge early dinner (so we can snack all night at the party), then we get dressed in our costumes and head to the park around 4 PM. That way, they have not exerted much energy throughout the day.
Categories:
Characters
Specialty Treats
Specialty Merchandise & Letters to Santa
Photo Spots, Holiday Drinks & Cookies
Shows & Interactive Experiences
Parades
Rides
Fireworks
Characters:
When we first arrived to the park, we checked our My Disney Experience app to see if it would show us the location of all the special Christmas characters. But it only showed us the current characters locations for regular park hours. At 7 PM, our My Disney Experience app did update, and it will begin to show us the specialty characters and their locations for Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas party. But you are in luck, we have them all here.
The tricky thing about characters is it eats up SO MUCH TIME. As exciting as it is to have all these rare characters, every single line is long. If you start at 4 PM, this Christmas party gives you a total of seven hours to do everything you want. So spending a couple of hours in line is not the best way to utilize your time during this party.
The longest line of the day is to meet Santa Jack and Sally from the Nightmare Before Christmas. People get in that line at 4 PM sharp and will wait anywhere from an hour and a half to three hours to meet this duo. As cool as that character is, it’s not worth it for me because we are not a family that regularly comes to Orlando and attends this party. My kids will attend this party once every couple of years because we don’t always hit the Christmas season on our few trips a year.
If meeting Santa Jack and Sally is the MOST important thing to you, it will be essential you get to the party as early as possible to meet them. Jack and Sally will be the first activity you need to go once you have your wristband. (If it is a MUST DO - like we are going to Orlando JUST FOR THIS - it may be worth it to get a park ticket and reservation and head to the park that day and literally wait at Town Square Theatre to get in line first.) Another time to see them with reduce wait time is at the end of the evening.
For a list of characters and their locations, click here.
Specialty Treats:
The great thing about holiday treats is the are available all day at Magic Kingdom! So this is a great place to start at 4 pm. We did not have a lot of time to eat them this year but for a full list of items click here.
Specialty Merchandise:
Disney does an excellent job adding specialty merchandise during these events. However, for Christmas 2022, they do not have holiday party-specific merchandise like in years past. On our way out, we decided to shop on Main Street at the Emporium, and my daughter wanted to buy all her siblings their Christmas gifts. And then, we would have Disney ship those items directly to our house so we wouldn’t have to worry about getting them on the plane. Plus, many items sold out on Shop Disney we found at the Emporium. It’s also one of the stops where you can send a letter to Santa. So, the cast member was kind enough to help my daughter formulate her letter to Santa, and then she stuck it in the Mailbox.
Photo Spots, Holiday Drinks & Cookies!
On your map, you’re going to see little symbols. A polaroid photo designated the location for photo frames with holiday scenes from Classic Festive Disney stories, then candy canes where you can get your complimentary delicious cookies and festive drinks. Allergy-friendly and alternative healthy options are available upon request.
Shows and Interactive Experiences:
Here we go again, having to make a game plan for attending something at the Disney Parks. There are multiple showtimes, but there is only one firework show. And depending on where you want to watch this, you need to have a game plan on what time you will need to find your viewing area. The shows are Mickey's Once Upson a Christmastime Parade, Mickey's Most Merriest Celebration, and the firework show Minnie's Wonderful Christmastime Fireworks Show. You also want to plan time to attend dance parties if that is on your family's priority list. One is in Fantasyland, two are in Tomorrowland, and the Country Bears interactive experience happens sporadically in Frontierland.
Parade:
There are multiple parade times. But like any Disney parade, you want to get there about 30 minutes before if you wish to have a specific spot or a front row spot on the curb. We did the parade by picking an area where we could quickly turn around and watch the Mickey’s Most Merriest Celebration afterwards. So it just depends on how you plan your time. Unfortunately for us, the Mickey’s Merriest Celebration show was canceled because of the rain.
Rides:
Space Mountain Overlay
We were the least interested in rides. There are about four rides that have a Christmas overlays to them. For instance, Space Mountain has laser lights and Christmas music. Jungle Cruise is converted to Jingle Cruise during this season at Walt Disney World. Tomorrowland Speedway and Monster’s Inc also get a Christmas overlay. On the other hand, this is a fantastic time to ride rides because the park has a lowered capacity, so many things are more available than they would be during the day. But you just had to decide if you are coming for the Christmas Party or are coming to get on rides with shorter wait times.
Fireworks:
You do not want to miss the fireworks, get there early to get a good spot. This show is pretty incredible. We thoroughly enjoyed it.
