How do you countdown with your kids?

[tinker*dust]

I'm looking for a clever way to countdown to WDW for my kids. We are a little more than a month out and my kids have started the "how many days now" question a couple times a day. What do you guys do? The paper chain?

 

[Mellie0119]

I made a big poster. Hit the craft store and bought up some Disney stickers, then we put up/pull down post it notes that we number. We've used it for 2 trips now. I might try to add some pictures to it for this trip.

I also made a photo slide show (with Disney back ground music) from all our Disney pics. We watch this quite a bit. :lol: My kids are little (5 and 2) so they just eat this up- we had to devise a system where the oldest gets to take down the odd numbered days, and DD the even numbers. They really get into it.

Here is a picture (haven't made the new date stickies yet )

 

[MotherOf2Princesses]

We leave in three weeks. And since my kids are only 2 and 5 we are telling them at Easter which is less than two weeks before we leave. They have little concept of time. Two weeks will seem like a long time for them. We have already told them that we let the Easter bunny in on a little secret. So we will tell them on Easter morinig. Of course they are getting mostly Disney stuff.
Well I have gotten stickers to put on the calendar for every day after Easter up till we leave on the 27th. You did not give your kids ages but since mine are young Disney sticker work just fine.
Good Luck

 

[tinker*dust]

These are good ideas.
My kids are 9 and 5 and already know about the trip. It's funny, the 9 year old wants to know exactly how many days. I just thought something he could see would keep my counting days to a minimum.

 

[TastefullyChris]

If your kids use the computer regularly, you can download a countdown clock. I have the Mousetracks clock on the bottom "toolbar" of the computer screen (19d:19h:25m). We also did the paper chain and looped it on our mantle. It is getting sooooo short!

 

[wendypooh]

We made a countdown calendar that we put on the fridge. On each day there was a disney character, castle, where we were eating, things we were going to do, each park, etc.... we were staying at AKL, so I had the lodge on one of the days.......... each day DS6 got to X it off, so he knew exactly how many days were left...... I let him color the calendar when we made it, he really enjoyed it. It is now in our trip scrapbook!!!!!


I really like Mellie0119's idea too..........

Have your kids make a countdown calendar......... they'll enjoy making it, and counting down the days!!! Have fun!!!

 

[Kitka]

I meant to do a wall calendar for them to count down on, but never got around to it. Some of you are so creative!

 

[justplaingoofy]

This should be done with kids, however I do it with my hubby (no kids)

Out of black construction paper I cut out 2 size circles.. One bigger one for mickeys head, and 2 smaller ones for his ears... The kids can decorate them, (I use glitter pens)and put countdown numbers on each...14, 13, 12, etc...

Every day I hide one and he finds his "hidden mickey"... Over the years he has come to really enjoy this.. If it gets to be too late in the day and he hasn't found it yet he says in a dissapointed tone "hey, wheres my hidden mickey"... Did I mention he's 41?

Hiding places I've used: taped inside the shower, on his rearview mirror, in lunch bag, in between folded napkin, taped to his dinner plate, in the microwave, in his reading book, in his money clip (hidden mickey fell onto the counter while getting coffee at Dunkin donuts!ha ha) but my favorite was when i taped it to the inside lid of the toilet.... he almost pee'd on mickey!

 

[CrimsonInnocence]

If your kids use the computer regularly, you can download a countdown clock. I have the Mousetracks clock on the bottom "toolbar" of the computer screen (19d:19h:25m). We also did the paper chain and looped it on our mantle. It is getting sooooo short!

Where did you get the Mousetracks Clock?

 

[ZipaDeeDooDah]

I tried to search on google for the Mousetracks clock and couldn't find any information on it, but it looks like there is a similar countdown clock for WDW at MagicalMountain.

We are doing the Disney countdown chain, but I love all of the ideas here too!

 

[mrsmagic]

We left on the 25th of January, and I printed a calendar page for the month of January, decorated it with Disney stickers, and put a Hershey's kiss on each day. Starting on January 1st, they had a kiss each day until we left. I made one for each of our kids, and it was easy and cheap. They loved it!

 

[imageid]

We told the kids today!!
We make a poster, we each draw one picture and in the middle we use post-it notes. We count down the days on the post-its. They stick nicely and every morning they take turns taking the number down! We use the same method at Christmas!

 

[RNLUVSDISNEY]

If you go to themouseforless.com you can print a paper chain to make with disney pictures on each link. My kids have those in their rooms. I've also read from some posters to go to home depot and get disney paint sample thingies (they are shaped like mickeys) and put those up in the kids rooms, then they can take one down each night. We also put stickers on the calendar every 10th day like 6 months before and try to do something disney-ish on each of those days. Let's face it mom (me) is the freak . I also print cards from disney magic artist and they "arrive in the mail" (ok I don't put stamps on) every couple weeks and have a little note from the character, like "Can't wait for you to come". My 6 year old thinks they're so real and so does my 9 year old neice. But, even though he loves them, my 8 yo is pretty sure they are from me.

 

[Harvest02]

We are doing the paper chain right now. I remember when we started it with over 100 days left until our trip! We are down to 24 days! WOO HOO!!! We take one chain off per day. Another cool thing I found to do is go to the Mouse for Less website and print out their Disney trivia questions. I glued one of these to each chain and then we have a trivia question to answer also. Let's them learn a little about the world before we go! Just FYI, there is also a trivia answer page on the website, so no need to keep guessing if you don't know the answers!