Is there anything special you do before your trip to DW??

[Darling729]

Myself, DH, DD (5) & DS (4) will be traveling to DW in less than 27 days....

We currently have a countdown going, read a Disney story every night, and we have been watching classic Disney movies ecery weekend as a family to prepare ourselves for the magic.

Also, we have been tivoing every DW program we can find (lots on travel channel and Discovery HD) to get ourselves "In the Spirit"!

Besides crusing these boards every day like me, what special things have you been doing to prepare yourselves for a big trip?

Darling729

 

[Patsfan7]

Every night before bed after her prayers (in an effort to stay up later) my daughter asks what I want to talk about, I ask her back, and each night is the same answer, "Disney". She is 4 and she is going for the 8th time next month, so she has plenty to talk about. What rides she wants to ride, what characters she wants to see, and always discusses the "remember when" from our previous trips. This is special to me, because as youngsters, my brother and I would do the exact same thing every night.....

I got lots of ideas from your post though! Thank you, and I look forward to hearing others ideas and incorperating them into our plan over the next 24 DAYS!!! WOO HOOO

 

[goofie4goofy]

Every night before bed after her prayers (in an effort to stay up later) my daughter asks what I want to talk about, I ask her back, and each night is the same answer, "Disney". She is 4 and she is going for the 8th time next month, so she has plenty to talk about. What rides she wants to ride, what characters she wants to see, and always discusses the "remember when" from our previous trips. This is special to me, because as youngsters, my brother and I would do the exact same thing every night.....

This is exactly what I do.....there is one big difference I am 41 years older than your daughter, and the conversation is with my DH

 

[!@#$%]

before we leave the house... We all stop in the driveway, and after a few "Did we forget anything?" questions back and forth we stop and say a good prayer for a safe trip.
On a trip last year, we missed I-95 on the drive down. First off, we do WDW 3-4 times a year, EVERY year. we know the way by heart. we NEVER miss I-95. maybe one of the smaller roads, but NEVER I-95, besides its the BIGGEST road with the BIGGEST sign.
On this particular trip, though we missed it. But I caught it pretty quick, and we did a U-Turn in the median and hit the exit ramp. We went MAYBE 30 seconds, and traffic started slowing down. The ambulance passed us and went on ahead. When we got up there, a guy in a truck had apparently either fallen asleep, ot commited suicide, because he crossed that huge area between the Northbound and Southbound, and he hit a lady in a Lincoln head on. By the time we got there, they already had a sheet over her face. She was dead. Using my watch and the odometer (we hit the odometer at the beginning of every exit ramp for the streets and tips distance calculation) we concluded that we would have been RIGHT THERE where she was at the time of the wreck if we HADN'T missed the exit. While its sad that she was someone going somewhere, and she didnt make it, the fact is she was in her 70s. She had lived a full life. It would have been far worse for a family of 4 with 2 young children to have ALL died.
So does the prayer work? After THAT experience, you'll never convince me it dont!

 

[hulagirl87]

i go to disney with 2 good friends and every sunday night we get together and watch a disney movie. one of those friends has his cel phone set to go off with an alarm that tells us how many weeks until we go. this week will be "3 weeks"!!!! yea! (and this week's movie is Sleeping Beauty - my choice )

 

[Moonpie]

I also watch Disney movies before we go on our trips! I also get some new clothes (preferably Disney related) to take on our trip!

 

[MariDisney]

We make a "countdown" chain of paper loops. Every day DD6 pulls one off. My Dsis has a paperclip chain at work.

And, once we're about 30 days out (which we are now) both DSis and I eat, sleep and breathe WDW...and pretty much force our kids to do the same. We review every detail of what we're going to do. In fact, I had DD on the Delta website tonight looking at our sear assignments and trying to decide how the 6 of us will sit on the various legs of the trip.

 

[Mariposa]

DD has a countdown of various colored Mickey heads (I made these, would've been easier to raid Home Depot, though). She takes one down every night. Tonight she took down #21.

Right now, I'm having to hold myself back from starting to pack clothes, etc. I'm trying to limit some of the active working I have to do on planning, too, because I know I'll need stuff to keep me busy the next few weeks (not that housework doesn't generally do that by itself).

 

[truebelievers]

I make sure to brush up on the words to songs just in case one of our bus drivers begins an impromptu sing along.

I also swing by the Disney Store in the mall (even though I never buy anything), if only to mentally prepare myself for the bombardment of merch once I actually get to WDW.

 

[liveforthemagic]

Me and DD8 just started a walking campaign so we are ready to walk around all day without anybody complaining that they are too tired.

 

[MinnieMousse]

Every night before we go to sleep (and every 20 minutes in the evening, and everytime we speak on the phone during the day...)I roll over to DH and say "we're going to Disney World!!!!" . After about two weeks of this I think the idea is finally starting to sink in . I've noticed that DH has started to react less and less...hmmmm...maybe I'm overdoing it a little bit, but I don't care! Besides, he only has 20 more nights to go...

 

[aztecgoods]

I've got a bunch of documentaries of WDW/Universal and other parks that I will pull out and watch a few times around the week or so before the trip. I have a really great one of AK that i will definitely check out again. I haven't been to AK yet and that is one of the big do items on the list this time around. The documentaries of the parks gets you going and also gives you ideas of things to see when you're there, and things to say hey that looks different in person than on the small screen. Plus it gives you a lot of insight into what to do in the first place.

 

[minniebeth]

Me and DD8 just started a walking campaign so we are ready to walk around all day without anybody complaining that they are too tired.

A must do! And break in new comfy shoes!

 

[frannn]

DH sometimes makes Disney food out of the cookbook he picked up last year, we watch the Disney World dvds I got for various occasions last year, we watch Disney movies, have planning pow-wows, pack & repack, but mostly, DH humors me and my neurotic obsessive compulsive WDW conversations. Used to do the countdown paper chain, but DD3 doesn't quite understand, so it would only be for my benefit this year. Oh yeah, forgot DH's Outlook "Disney thought of the day". He sets off an Outllook reminder to go off, using the zippidy doo dah tip for the day music, reminding me to call someone, or do something for the trip. Did I tell you how much I love my DH?

 

[INdisneyfamily]

We make a "countdown" chain of paper loops. Every day DD6 pulls one off.

We started the paper chain when my girls were little. I would cut white strips and they would draw and color Disney characters on each one then make the chain. Sometimes we start it with up to 70-80 days till we go...lots of drawing! Surprisingly now that they are teenagers, they still do it. Last year they popped in a Disney movie and started drawing without me even saying a word about it.

 

[Tnkrbelle565]

DD2 has insisted the we engage daily in a "question and answer" session with her dolls every evening. She makes DH and I give them voices and "ask" questions about Disney and she answers them from her limited Disney knowledge, since she has never been.

 

[MinnieMousse]

I think DH is starting to worry about me. I call the WDW Dine # every day to try and make changes in our dining plan. I'm still holding out for a Fantasmic Dinner on the night of Sept. 18th. I figure if I call often enough, something has to come up, right?

 

[Caleb's Mom]

We tried the paper chain thing last year when my son was 4. Didn't work too well - he thought if he took off more than one link per day he could go to Disney sooner!!!!

 

[wdwcoltsfan]

We tried the paper chain thing last year when my son was 4. Didn't work too well - he thought if he took off more than one link per day he could go to Disney sooner!!!!

Sounds like a very smart little boy! I think that was a brilliant idea!


Rachel

 

[frndofpooh]

We declare whatever day that is 100 days out from our vacation to be "Disney Day". We start the day with Mickey waffles and discuss the trip over breakfast. The rest of the day is filled with playing the Disney trivia game, watching Disney movies/cartoons and reading Disney stories. It gets us in the mood!

About a month before we leave we start the paper chain, and two weeks out is when we start the disney movie fest.

Look at our signature - it's time to heat up the waffler!!!