Is this an unreasonable amount for my children?

[WDmommyof4]

For our upcoming trip I plan to give my boys $30 each to spend however and whenever they choose on souvies. Does anyone think this is unreasonable and will not be nearly enough? I like to teach them the value of a dollar and am frugal in my day to day life, so if they spend it all on something that is not a good value then that is a chance I am willing to take and they will have to live with their decision.

I should mention that they all already have Mickey ear hats, autograph books and pens. I have also bought them pins already and they have them on lanyards ready to go. In addition I will be paying for their hair cut and color plus pixie dust while we are there. For nighttime I purchased some glow sticks and glow swords to try and deter them from wasting money on the light up toys at Disney as well.

 

[Gr8t Fan]

I think that's perfectly reasonable and will hopefully teach them a good lesson about $$. I do the same with my 3 girls (and will eventually do the same with my son but he's only 2 now). They know now that if they blow it all on the first day on something and later decide they want something else, I'm not going to buy it. So they base their decisions accordingly. I've actually had my oldest DD not buy anything and bring the $$ back home to put in her wallet, which was just fine with me too. She must not have seen anything she wanted.

 

[mster425]

Not an unreasonable amount, especially for all the "mommy buy me's" of the little stuff around the parks.

$30 is not enough for a sweatshirt or long sleeved tee shirt at the parks from what I remember, so maybe stop at a Disney store or outlet and pick a special tee shirt on sale so they aren't tempted! We got ours there last year for $5 each, and they still remind me of that Disney trip because we bought them especially for it, and are wearing them in the pics.

 

[Tnkrbelle565]

As the PP said, they will be limited by what they can buy with $30 at the parks due to the insane prices but I think that amount is perfectly reasonable. If your kids are anything like mine...they'll only ask for small things anyway (candy, pins, etc)

 

[Hannathy]

It is doable. However I might up it to $50 if it is to include everything. That way they can buy something nice like a star wars thing at the studios or something nice from Epcot and still have $10 or $15 to spend on something "junkier" or souveniry or just little that catches their eye.

 

[Justsyd2]

I think that's a little low for eight days considering it's WDW. If it were $30 per day for all of them, I'd say that's great, but $30 each for 8 days doesn't sound like very much at all to me. I think it's great to be frugal at home, but on vacation it's a little hard when they'll have so many tempting things to look at!

 

[VirataMama4]

I have to agree with the PP that $30 isn't enough for a t-shirt or sweatshirt, but should be plenty for all the little things kids want to buy.

I usually make a family shirt and then each kid gets at least one specially made for them! Even my pre-teens like them!

Have a great trip

 

[disneymayz]

We will typical buy our kids something around $30. Anything else they want they have to use there own money. Now we go every year so there is only so much that you HAVE to have. We make a mental list of things while we are walking through the parks. On the last day before the last or the last day we shop. They figure out on that list what they really would want and they get it. Kids are not going to be buy the sweatshirts. They are going to be buying that lightsaber, cars, "boy stuff". Both my kids went down this past Jan with around 100 each (they saved it). Son came home with 80 and daughter came home with 50. She made a shirt (under $30) at DTD. "The list" method has saved us a ton of "can I have that" and a ton of money.

 

[mjkacmom]

I think that's a little low for eight days considering it's WDW. If it were $30 per day for all of them, I'd say that's great, but $30 each for 8 days doesn't sound like very much at all to me. I think it's great to be frugal at home, but on vacation it's a little hard when they'll have so many tempting things to look at!

That would be about $1000 on souveniers! Yikes! I personally can't stand them, so my kids got $25, and they were fine.

 

[ohanaMAMA]

We have always given our girls $50 for the week. Then reminded them that we would be visiting the outlet stores before leaving for home. So they had money available to them in the parks.. but if they used it? It was gone and they wouldnt have money for spending in the outlets. Of course there were a few "treats" that mom and dad picked up along the way. I always have glow sticks for night time, and had "glow cubes" from a recent crusie to add to thier drinks at fantasmic. Tinkerbell also often leaves "surprises" to be found in the mornings... sometimes a tshirt, or a special snack for the day.

 

[Nayan]

If shopping in the World on a budget, look at everything! We went last year and in the American Pavillion they had patriotic Mickey shirts for $10. I bought two of them and because they were large (adult large) I gave them as gifts to my cousins who wore them as nightshirts. You can find some nice deals, but you really have to look for them.

 

[ZPT1022]

I think that $30 is a bit low but I like to encourage my kids to get a more "useful" souvenir like a hoodie or a shirt or something they would use anyhow, rather than those little impulse buys that seem like so much fun at WDW but don't necessarily translate back at home (I hope that makes sense).

What we tend to do is tell them to just look at everything and we will make decisions at the end of the trip and do all of our buying at once. We've even gone so far as to take a digital pic of whatever must have item so they can remember what it was but typically they've forgotten about it by the end of the day, if not sooner.

I think that if you really want to give them a lesson in frugality, tell them that you will only be giving them a limited amount of money but give them opportunities to earn more, or ask for it as birthday gifts or whatever. Then they can learn about saving for something special and of course, it's always funny to watch how much more reluctant to part with the money they are if it's their money and not Mom and Dad's

 

[WDmommyof4]

Thanks for all the great input. I forgot to mention a few things in the original posting. First, we go to Disney at least once a year, so they always have the option of saving some things for later. Second, I do make them custom shirts at home before we go, so they have never asked for a shirt or sweatshirt at the World.

Last year I took only my two oldest and while I didn't give them their own money to spend, they really didn't end up asking for a lot. Last year I purchased them each one of those little light up string things for $16 at the kiosks, a medallion necklace for like $5 at POTC for my oldest and a sword for the younger one. Other than that they asked for nothing, so I actually spent less than $30 on each of them last year.

We have been going for years though and they do have things from years past. I figured $30 was good since I invested on the pins before the trip. If you add in the cost of the pins that I bought them for the trip it is over $50 per child for the trip.

 

[kaytieeldr]

$30 is not enough for a sweatshirt or long sleeved tee shirt at the parks from what I remember, so maybe stop at a Disney store or outlet

Or even your local Walmart, and bring them with you.

I think that's a little low for eight days considering it's WDW. If it were $30 per day for all of them, I'd say that's great, but $30 each for 8 days doesn't sound like very much at all to me

But $80 each sounds high. That's $240, vs. the less than $100 the OP was planning.

 

[sweetdana]

If it is on site shopping, like Lego Store, or a sweat shirt I agree with the poster of 50$. Maybe they can "earn" more on there own. Like if they have an allowance, or paying them to do extra chores for up to 20$ more and having them save.
I think teaching about them about $$ and budgeting is awesome.

 

[Donnainnj]

We give the kids $5 a day, and then usually buy them one special thing ourselves for around $20 each, but my kids are older (16 and 12). When they were younger we gave them less so the $30 doesn't seem unreasonable to me. You might want to make a trip to the store in DTD that sell everything $10 and less, we have found the grab bags a pretty good deal.
Donna

 

[Polyluvr]

Amazing! I have to buy my boys practically everything in the parks, we budget about 75-100 a day for all the stuff they have to have! They are only 8 and 5 though, so they don't have their own $$ yet. Congrats!!

 

[puffkin]

I think it sounds a bit low. Here is what we do (BTW we go 2x a year):

My DS is little but when we take my nieces they get about $20-$30 for the week. They can use that for anything...junkie souvenirs, candy, etc. I then keep a list of all the things they love in the stores and think they might want. Then about mid week we go over the list and they pick their favorite and we try to get them that. I try to steer them towards more practical things. But if they really want somethign like a hoodie or a quality toy (ie DS has been begging for some Star Tours toy everyday since our Dec trip) or something I would rather give them that $50 for the hoodie rather than just having a flat limit of $30 that they waste on junk.

It works out to be about $50-$75 per child but the sytem works out well. They still get some freedom to spend money on whatever they want, but they still come home with a practical souvenir and it is not a huge budget buster.

 

[DVCBELLE]

I find the more we go - the less my kids want. I don't give them a set budget - b/c if they have the money in their hand - I know them and they will buy every little thing they want and we just end up with a bunch of junk. And while I know that is their choice - I still prefer to steer them to what I know will make them happy. Instead over the course of the week - they look and if I notice something that they are consistently asking for - then I usually buy it in the first couple of days. After that we wait until the end of the week and I take them in the World of Disney and let them pick what they want. Then we decide what to get. In all, I don't ever spend more than $50 per child a trip now.

In recent years - mine have been collecting the Disney babies - so I know they will want that. I also find asking them before we leave what they want this trip -helps us focus in on what they can buy once we get there!

 

[ilovejack02]

I usually give my DS7 around 50.00 to spend and with grandparents throwing in he usually ends up with about 80 to spend. He never spends it on the little stuff , one year it was a big lego set, last year it was a monorail set.
Just depends on what you think they want. We always go with an idea of what we want and dont nickle and dime it away. I always hit the clearance racks at disney store so we go with tshirts and light up stuff etc.