Ok, I'll confess...I've lied about my kids' ages. I really didn't feel like paying for an airline ticket for my child, who had already turned two, when I knew she'd spend the entire flight screaming in my lap. She was extremely small for her age (like 5th percentile, if even) and our friends with connections at the airline agreed with our decision and kind of looked the other way. I know this was WRONG, but at the time, it was easier to pass her off as a twin to her 18-month old brother, who still got on the plane free.
We've also walked right into Six Flags pushing our child in a stroller, without buying her a ticket, but nobody even ever questioned us or stopped us. We didn't even realize until later (after the fact) that the sign said "Children UNDER 3" are free...we honestly thought it was "3 and under"....so I felt bad, but wasn't about to back and go fork over $40 for her, when, again, she mostly rode in the stroller the entire day.
In many cases, when I feel like it's not going to be an issue, I do what is best for my child. I'd never pay adult price for a kid who barely eats (in fact, I eat even less than most tween boys, so I buy off the kids menu myself when I can get away with it), but if I knew I'd have to provide proof of age for anything, I always follow the rules. Usually this involves either splitting one meal amongst my kids, or taking home leftovers. Not sure how it works in Disney. If you can get a room with a fridge/microwave, it might be worth trying to take your daughter's food back to your room and stretching one meal into two or three (and thus saving credits for, say, a character meal or something). But if this isn't feasible, like you're in the park in the middle of the day and don't want to leave or lug food around with you, you should just get her counter service snacks. So, my advice for you: only try to pass her off as 9 (since this was your original plan) if you aren't going to be asked by anyone at all for any reason. This would probably be impossible, since you'll need tickets to get in (were you going to buy her a child's admission?), if you fly, you'll have to tell her age at check-in (the airline employees always want age or DOB of kids to verify), etc. You don't want to tell your daughter to lie to people.
My moral: cheating sometime pays off, but if/when you get caught, it costs more in the long run: money, time, embarrassment, guilt, etc. It's just not worth it, especially where kids are involved. Luckily for me, we never got caught. But I feel bad for cheating the system when everyone else (as far as I know) followed the rules.
