Anyone else surprising the kids???

[lori123]

We are planning to keep it a surprise for awhile - but I can't wait until Christmas (we sail mid January!) because there is just too much planning. There is no way I will be able to make things, shop and plan in private! I homeschool too - so no time to myself! We are making this trip a combined birthday (their birthday is in Jan) and Christmas gift. I am thinking of telling them in November - wrapping a box, in a box, in a box kinda thing - alternating the boxes with Christmas and birthday wrap. I will also include little things as they open and put the DCL DVD in the last box for them to watch

 

[wonkadeb]

My kids are sooooo excited about our January double dip cruise. It is our 1st cruise. They have been watching the DVD, reading the brochures, and talking about it non-stop. The anticipation has been a fun and welcomed family affair. They have even memorized the ship decks and exactly where our room is located. They understand that we will be in a cat 10B, and are very excited about the opportunity to have the split bathroom and larger digs. What they DON'T KNOW is that thanks to Silverfox97, I was alerted to the KSF sale, and now we have a cat 5C VERANDA room, for the same price as the original booking!!! My DH and I are waiting until the holidays to creatively surprise them with the news. I remember how excited they were to get a balcony room at the Wilderness Lodge last summer. They sat out in their robes overlooking the water, and loved it. I can't imagine how exciting it will be for them to get to enjoy the fresh sea air and dolphin watch! Yay, Disney!!!

 

[Sarabi's Cubs]

We are leaving the day after Christmas for our first Disney cruise and planned to surprise the kids Christmas morning, but the closer we get, the more I think I cannot hold it in. Plus, at some point they are going to notice that I'm obsessively reading a Disney cruise guide or something like that and it will be blown anyway. I'm thinking about just telling them.

 

[txsoccermom]

I'm here to give hope and inspiration to all that might be feeling the need to blurt the secret out - DON'T DO IT!

Here's my plan, for hopefully 1 wk before we leave (4 wks before is Valentine's Day, so that would be the earliest):

1. 3 boxes to open - 1 for beginning, middle and end of trip.
2. Beginning box - toy space shuttle (b/c we will be at KSC the day/nite before)
3. Middle box - cardboard treasure chest (from Oriental Trading for about $4) filled w/ "hints"....pirate eye patches, names made out of letters filled w/pirate Mickey and Minnie, steamboat willie snowglobe, "nautical" Disney pins, small sand shovels, sunscreen tube, and a puzzle (note from Mickey saying come join me on the cruise)!
4. Ending Box - Universal Studios brochure (this is the part for DH!)

So, I figure I'll let them choose which box to open first, while strategically working it to go in order of beginning, ending and then middle of the trip! Oh, I can't wait

I'm already making FE gifts at nite when the kids and DH are asleep However, I know I won't be able to pack for all of us and still keep it a secret, so that's why I plan on dropping the bomb before we leave. Oh, time fly fast .... pls

Good luck to all of you still holding out

 

[StJohnfamily]

OMG...I get home tonight and my DD (9) asks if we are going to Disney World for Christmas. I ask her why she would ask such a thing? She says, 'mom, I saw this yellow paper by the computer and it has some stuff on it." I ask her to explain and she goes and gets my notes about our trip and says mom, I know we are going somewhere and it says on the 16th we are going to the x-mas party at Magic Kingdom and I know that x-mas means Christmas. I could not hold the smile in any longer and had to spill the beans.....

 

[dbarker]

DS11 knows we are going on a cruise................what he doesn't know, is that we are going to WDW and staying at AKL a few days before the cruise.

 

[lsjones]

***

 

[lsjones]

Sorry!! For some reason my posts are ending up on the wrong thread!

 

[primgirl]

Our kids think we are leaving on Saturday. We are actually leaving on Friday.

 

[twinmom108]

We booked our first Disney Cruise for Oct 2006 in November 2004. Deciding to surprise our 3 sons, we had to keep our big mouths shut for almost two years. We Booked two SPH rooms on the Magic Western Itinerary cruise.
Months ahead of the cruise I started to set them up. First by asking them if they wanted to do a tour of the Disney Magic ship since it was going to be in port the day we were traveling out to see the Kennedy Space Center - they said yes. A month or so later I said maybe we could do lunch on the ship would they like me to check into it & they said yes.

Closer to cruise time they were wondering what all we were going to do the second week of our vacation. I had to think fast so I said maybe we'll see a Pirate Museum, go to a pirate party & we could have Key Lime pie for the twins birthday. (We were in Key West on their Bday & we did have Key Lime Pie!) I didn't know how far we could take it or how long I could hold out without slipping or showing my excitement. Reading these boards the furtherest I'd seen anyone get was arriving at the port when the surprise was finally revealed.

The night before the cruise Dh & I tagged the luggage after the boys went to bed. Later we tried to load the "tagged" bags into the rental car. There we were standing in the Wilderness Lodge Parking lot in the middle of the night for an hour trying to figure how to get all the bags into the trunk. Finally we decided to put the 2 bags that didn't fit into the back seat upside down so the boys wouldn't see the DCL tags that had our last name & stateroom #'s on them.

The morning of the cruise we did a character breakfast at O'hanas with Lilo & Stitch then set out for the drive to the Port. When we arrived I told the boys that we would have to go through security & since they'd be treating us just like all the other passengers to just go with it. I told the boys to wait for us in the terminal since it was so hot & it was air-conditioned inside. They did peek out once to see what we were doing because they thought maybe we were doing something special for their Bday - LOL I shewed them back inside & got the porters to take the luggage away immediatedly. DH went to return the rental car & I joined the boys inside. Once upstairs I had them take a seat watching the movies while I checked everyone in.

Once boarding started I mentioned to a CM that we were surprising our boys & that they still didn't know they were actually going on this cruise. He was the one that actually took our cards and mentioned to one of our boys that "You know you'll have to get off of the ship in a little while" & my son acknowledged that he knew that. The boys didn't understand when we had to stand their to take the boarding photo & none of them smiled. They thought it was humorous that our Name was announced as we got on the ship. As promised we went up to Topsiders & had lunch - they thought that was so cool. Asked the twins if they wanted to see the teen club & they said.......yes, so we checked it out. The CM at the stack almost gave it away when she asked what their names were & when they started to tell her, she was checking off their names on her clipboard & said "YES". I got her attention, told her we were just "touring the ship" while winking at her and she recovered quite well and told us to look around & enjoy.

At that point the staterooms were ready so I said I was going to check to see if we could see a stateroom. I suggested that they check out the kids area for our other son. I went to our rooms & put up Bday decorations & made sure that the basket I had ordered from Shirley for our twins 14th birthday was in the room. Then I found my DH and DS's and said we could look at a stateroom. They were excited so off we went to 5024.

The twins saw the birthday basket was for them and was surprised that I was able to get that on board without them seeing it, but they still weren't getting the real surprise. Finally I had to yell out "WE'RE NOT GETTING OFF THE SHIP FOR 7 DAYS!!!" They were so shocked and dumfounded that it took them awhile to get excited. Our younger son said "I'm not going to believe it till the ship sails and I'm still on it." To make a longer story short this was the biggest surprise the boys ever had and they are still surprised that we were able to pull it off. Needless to say they had a blast!

As I said before I didn't know how far we could take the surprise. We took it much farther than we thought was possible but we actually made it all the way inside our staterooms before "letting the cat out of the bag".

Have a blast with your surprise - it truly can be magical.

Disney Dreamin'
Sharon

 

[diskam]

We're planning to wait until at least Christmas to tell the kids about our Jan 3-8th cruise. The last time we went to WDW our DD, then 5, invited several children from her Kindergarten class to go with us. Very generous, but she was upset when they couldn't go, they were upset when they couldn't go, and their parents weren't exactly happy either. I'd like to think in the last two years, she's learned to check with me before offering to take friends, but her generosity still outweighs her good sense. If we wait until she won't see her friends before leaving, it will cut out a lot of the drama.

I'm thinking we'll wait until New Year's Eve to tell them, but I'm not sure I can sell "Your teachers forgot to give you this homework they assigned over Christmas Break. Please finish it now!"

 

[mindelmouse]

I'm glad I found this thread again because before our 8-18 med cruise I mentioned that I had kept this a secret from my kids since our last cruise on 11/1/08 and I was busting a gut trying to keep the secret. Just wanted to update you on how wonderfully it went. We decided to tell the kids in the airport right before we boarded the plane (they knew we were going to Barcelona, but knew nothing about the cruise) because we were taking a tour the next morning with some other Disboard families and didn't want the surprise to slip out.

I prepared a powerpoint packet (I know my corporate mentality came out) and gave it to them to read. It said everything is not as it seems and that they weren't just going to Barcelona and then I listed every country on a page that they were going to with the country's flag. Then I had a picture of the kids with Captain Mickey from the last cruise and lastly a picture of the ship. As they flipped through the pages you saw the amazement in my daughter's eyes and my son was besides himself and couldn't even talk. It took them a minute or two to realize they were going on a cruise and they were so excited. If I can figure out how to post the video I will.

So anyone thinking about it....do it...it was great.

The worst part for them was when we came back everyone asked how their cruise was and they were amazed that everyone knew but them.

 

[twinmom108]

Mindy,

As you can tell from my post I just love a surprise. I absolutely love what you did for your kids & I'm so happy it came off so well! You are so right in telling others who are thinking of surprising their kids to just do it! There are so many different creative ways it can be done.

 

[ClubDis]

We surprised our kids this year in January. Here's the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cb2ISuWuIek

It was SOOOOO hard to wait to tell them and keep it from them, but we did it! And, it was worth it!!!! I love where my third boy reads the t-shirt that says, "My parents surprised me with a Disney Cruise today" and he says, "No you didn't!" Duh!!!!!

I happened to see your video last night. It was so cute how long it took for it to set in! You're third son almost sounds a little sad when he says "No you didn't".

 

[ClubDis]

I don't have kids yet, but I'm currently planning on surprising my DBF with an Alaska cruise for his 21st bday in June. Not quite sure how I'm going to do that yet though. I have brought up the possibly going on a Canada vacation since I just got my passport and want to use it. I'm hoping to keep it a secret until we get to the port. Not sure if that will work yet if he has to sign doc's ahead of time.

 

[bnacpa]

We are planning on a Holloween cruise and this will be the first with the kids. When we booked and did the online planning there is a link for having a character call with the kids. I plan on having Mickey tell the kids a few days before the cruise. Holloween is on a Sunday this year which means many of our community activities will be on Friday and Saturday.

The hope is to have Mickey call Friday night after one of our neighborhood parties and then the kids can help pack on Saturday since Mickey will have invited them on the cruise.

Now if I can only figure out how to do those door magnets ... I am artistically challenged as an Accountant, unfortunately

 

[jsolar]

I also surprised my 2 children, 7 and 3.
For me it didn't work as well as I would have liked.
In 2009 we were on the Magic. Both kids loved it so much, all they ever talked about was going back on the "Mickey Boat" We booked for the Dream onboard so that sure did help.
Last minute in June, 2010 we booked to go on the Wonder leaving in August. While my kids would see me getting things ready, such as all of the FE gifts, they thought it was for the Dream (it's nice that young kids have no concept of time.)
We finally told them the day before we were leaving. I expected my older son to jump up and down or scream. He just said, really we are leaving tomorrow. Okay.
My husband thinks its because we didn't allow him the chance to get excited along with us. Of course when we got there, he was so happy and had the best time. Now we are counting down until the Dream.

Basically, you just have to know your children (although I thought I did) and what works for you.

Have a great time!!

 

[txsoccermom]

Bumping for new ideas....trying to hold our until Mother's Day, b/c that is my mom's 80th bday and I got her a cabin too! That will be 3 wks before school is out, so it won't distract my kids from the final tests in elementary school The problem I see is my mom is a control freak and might be negative Nellie on it b/c she didn't plan it.

Oh well, would love to hear new thoughts!

 

[eastchinarogers]

We, too, are going to surprise our kids DD (9) and DS (12). We are sailing on the Dream November 27th so we are going to go to Cocoa Beach the day before and tell them we are hanging out at the beach for a few days....cannot wait to see their faces when we arrive at the port

 

[socababy]

The kids have no idea about our Thanksgiving cruise or their spring break cruise. I'm not quite sure what I will be doing. I was thinking for this November to tell them we are going to go see a movie down in LA like we did when we saw Toy Story 3 at the El Capitan. I think the Lion King comes out in 3d sometime in the fall so that could be a goo dmivie to tell them we are seeing. Little will they know we will actually be seeing it on the cruise (hopefully.) Then I woudn't be lying. LOL I think I can get the luggage in the car without them knowing.