Crowds don't bother me much. I love the excitement crowds generate. Growing up in an Italian/Albanian household, I'm used to chaos. Thanksgiving dinners frequently had more than 40 plates set. Mayhem, noise, arguments, and camaraderie were rampant. I'm very comfortable with chaos. It reminds me of fun.
My wife, on the other hand, comes from a much smaller family. Order and respect trump silliness at dinner. Her first meal at our house was quite a culture shock. On our wedding rehearsal dinner, I sat next to her and her family. at one table. My family took up the rest of the room. Her brother quietly picked his head up from eating and said, "How are you supposed to eat with all this noise?" To this day, she's uncomfortable with crowds.
To that end, we choose our Disney vacations around slower times. We used to go in May, but with the Flower & Garden Show, local high school events, and very mild weather, that season became too crowded for her. Once, the Millennium Dreamers were being honored at Walt Disney World. Too frequently, as we approached a line, the docent would arrive ahead of us, raise his or her flag, and a swarm of Dreamers would overwhelm the queue. We planned the rest of the trip around avioding which park the Dreamers were in.
We used to go in slow time between Thanksgiving and Christmas, but alas that is not slow anymore. So most recently we've opted for the traditional "slow time" in October. Our next-to-last trip was so crowded, I made the next reservation for what I thought was a very slow season -- September. Wrong!!! Every park was packed every day of an 11-night stay. DW was so frustrated on a packed-like-sardines, hard-ticket event (Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party,) she said, "Disney is driving us away. They're more concerned with gate receipts than customer satisfaction. This isn't fun anymore!"
Sometimes when we're at dinner, DD and I play Guess-The-Wait-Times game. We will look at the My Disney App and attempt to guess the wait times. On Sunday in February, the Magic Kingdom had ridiculous wait times. 75 minutes for 7D. 90 minutes for Space Mountain.
This was a Sunday in February with a 50 percent chance of rain and, looking at the radar, rain was on the doorstep.
So if a rainy Sunday in February is crowded, when isn't it crowded anymore???