Stroller Decisions: Disney with little ones series

This post is part of my Disney with Little Ones series.  We recently went with our family to Disney World and took our 4 year old, 23 month old, and 5 month old with us, and I survived with my sanity in tact...I think.

One of my biggest concerns regarding our trip to Disney was the stroller situation.  Here's the information that I weighed as I made decisions on whether I should bring my big double stroller, use umbrella strollers, rent strollers at the park, or use a stroller rental company.

At Disney, stollers are a must with children under the age of 6 or so.  Every book and website out there will tell you this.  There's just too much walking to do.  My kids were 5 months, 23 months, and 4 when we went, so we needed strollers for all 3 children.

We would only have 2 people pushing strollers.  Yes, I went with extended family, but because of various circumstances, we knew we wouldn't have a spare adult with us the entire time, so we needed an option that would allow for only my husband and I to push.  This meant we would need a double and single stroller.

We were flying, and airlines don't typically allow large double strollers like mine.  But again, with the ages of my kids, I would need strollers to make it through the airports.

My youngest two children would need naps during the day, but my double stroller doesn't recline much for napping and umbrella strollers aren't great at that either.

All of this information led me to rent a double stroller.  

Disney Parks strollers are made for bigger children, not children under two, cost $15/day for a single stroller and $31/day for a double, and they're not made very comfortably.  You can see a picture of them here.  It was out of the question for me.

After weighing all of my options, I finally decided on the following:

My Ergo baby carrier and two umbrella strollers connected would get us through the airports.  The connectors would make it difficult to get through the parks, and as I mentioned before, umbrella strollers don't recline for naps.

Airport + Ergo = Easy

We would use one umbrella stroller for my 4 year old at the parks.

My 4 year old, just chilling.  

We would rent a double stroller from Magic Stroller Rentals for my boys.  The stroller was amazing.  It was easy to push around and comfy enough for my boys to sit all day without complaint.  Naps were easy--they just crashed whenever they felt like it.  And if my daughter needed a nap, we would give her a turn in the double stroller and let her snuggle up with our iPod, where her favorite bedtime music would put her to sleep.

My little guys watching fireworks in the rented double stroller.

I checked out other companies too, but Magic Stroller Rentals had excellent reviews by some notable Disney bloggers, so that convinced me.
  
The strollers at Magic Stroller are $25/day for a double stroller, cheaper than Disney, and they're only $9/day on subsequent days.  The company drops the strollers off at your hotel or resort and then picks them up on your last day.  Resorts are used to this, so it's nothing new for them to have strollers dropped off and picked up frequently.

I was so glad I decided to rent a double stroller from an outside company, but I was also happy I brought an umbrella stroller for my daughter.  There was no need to have a bigger stroller for her anyway, so we were able to be cheap with her stroller and spend money where it really mattered--the good double stroller.

How have you handled strollers at Disney?  What worked for your family?