Surprising the kids!

[autismgoesdisney]

We leave in 10 days and this year we are surprising our kids for the first time! We plan to just wake them up at 3:00 am by telling them to get in the car because we are going to Disney! Can't wait! Anyone else surprise their kids? How did it go?

 

[detarica]

I did. Here's a cautionary tale...We got them up at their normal time to go to Summer care. Then we told them we had decided to not go to work, but to go to Disney World. (We had annual passes and got an awesome offer, so we did a long weekend in August.) We had the car packed and ready......so...when we told them (girls, age 3 and 8).....and...they didn't believe us. Then after 5 minutes of confusion on their behalf...when they did start believing us, they freaked out because they were sure that we didn't pack all the things that they needed....and it wasn't until then that I realized that they love the planning, packing, and anticipation as much as we do...they were super excited by the time we got there, but the initial reaction was a little disappointing for me....I thought they would jump up and down and cheer, but they were stunned and confused.

 

[Dancing Queen]

We surprise them every time we go. We make a little puzzle/scavenger hunt and they have to put the clues together to figure it out. This has worked the past two times.

But this time we are driving (we have flown in the past) and loading them up at 3am and probably won't give them clues/puzzle until first rest stop after they wake up. Hopefully it will go smoothly. I am having them pack their own things.

It's so fun surprising them - they get so excited!

Enjoy your trip!

 

[ChloeH]

We surprised them once. It was a lot of fun and they loved the surprise! It was so great the moment they realized where we were going (it was the first time for them)

The only kid we told was my 5 year old nephew, but he has autism and was non-verbal so he didn't tell anyone else! He does better when he is prepared ahead of time.

We did tell them we weren't going to surprise them again. That way every time we say we have a surprise they won't think we're going to Disney. Lol.
The other two times we told them a long time before hand but I think I liked the surprise the best.

 

[#1 Goofy Fan]

A few years ago we surprised DS and DD. We drove and told them we were going to somewhere - (named 5 places last being GA to visit family) - once we crossed into GA they knew we were going to visit family - once they saw the "welcome to FL" sign the screams in the car were deafening - I think my ears are still ringing. We then gave them their "Disney" surprises.

(A word of caution we drove through the night leaving at 7 p.m. and every time we stopped they woke up thinking we were at the surprise.)

Have fun with the surprise.

 

[MomTo3PrincessesInNJ]

2 out of our 3 trips were surprises.

Here's the first:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lc5JlEGQN20&sns=em

Our oldest was very excited, our middle daughter was tired and apparently thirsty, lol... They are 7 and 3, so I expected our 7 year old to be more into it anyway.

Every kid is different, but I'm glad my girls like the surprise

 

[Altoqueenkelly]

We are surprising my daughter (age 7) this year for the first time. I'm really excited! We leave on a Wednesday and she is missing school for the trip so we plan to wake her super early for "school" and tell her to start getting ready. At age 7 she isn't clock dependent and wont likely notice that is it 4am . We then have Mickey & Minnie Helium balloons that we will fill and put in a box with a shirt I made her that says: "I'm going to Disney". I was thinking of calling her into the living room with the the box sitting in the middle of the floor after she brushes her teeth and have her open it. My daughter has been twice before, but not for the last three years, she looks at the photo-books all the time and asks when we can go back. We just keep telling her that we cant afford to go this year.

I'm really excited because we leave on a 7am flight, so, we'll be in MK by lunch

 

[Stephaniesue]

We surprised DD and DS for our first trip. We told them we were going to FL to the beach for a week. We drove down. We stopped at a hotel just a few miles from Disney for the night. We then packed up and headed to Disney, they saw all the signs.

I am sitting there with the camera and I'm going oh my gosh look at all the signs for Disney. DS says are we going there? I said yes we are going to Disney World!!

DD looks at me, but we are going to the beach still right? WHAT?! I shut off the camera, I was so upset LOL!

Once we got there she was fine and was very appreciative. We did go to the beach as well.

For our family, surprises aren't fun. So we have let them help plan this trip, they are so excited.

 

[Kae]

We surprised our kids once. We were in Naples & we had 2 days left on our hopper passes fo me, DH & DS and DD was 18 months & never been. We told them we were going to visit some cousins about 3 hours away. DS saw the Mickey shaped Electric Towers and figured it out. the kids were sooo excited. It was a great quick trip.

kae

 

[AUDramaQueen]

First time we surprised them my kids were 4, 2 and 6 or 7 months. We loaded them up after my (now ex) husband got off work.

Told them we were going to go somewhere where we had to do a lot of walking. We had just been camping so my oldest asked if we were going hiking. I told him "something like that"

Well every big clump of trees we passed for the first 3 hours of the drive he asked if we were hiking there?

What about there?......

........That looks like a good place to hike.

For......3.......hours! It was very hard not to just tell them then!

Anyway, I knew everyone would be asleep by the time we got to Disney, but I was not prepared for how hard it would be to wake them up in time to see the signs! They were excited once they did wake up, but I had to put down my camera to shake them awake.

The second time my current boyfriend and I decided to surprise our kids with a Spring Break trip(ages 12, 12, 10, 9, & 7). My kids had been to Disney a ton of times at this point so I knew they would figure it out when we headed that way so we told them were were going to St. Augustine.

We made a video for them to watch the morning we left telling them all the things we were gonna do in St. Augustine like see pirates, go on a safari, see a drive-in movie (we had SciFi Dine In ressies), etc then we said something like Wait...we can do all these things at Disney World!

My oldest knew something was up as soon as we pulled out the video. My boyfriend's daughter was super excited, but also asked "We're going to St, Augustine too, right?" She had apparently done some research on things to do down there! Told her we would have to go there for sure sometime. Felt bad about that, but we had a great trip.

Another thing to watch out for with this bait-and-switch tactic - the next summer when we went to Savannah for vacation, the kids all swore we were really going to Disney World, and we were just tricking them again!

We probably won't do surprises anymore as my kids like helping me plan too much now, but it is really fun to set up and see their faces! Enjoy!!

 

[andieb0602]

We surprised our kids with their first trip when they were 5 and 2. DD had just finished up preschool and was heading to kindergarten the next year. We woke them up the Saturday morning right after preschool "graduation" and told them there were lots of things we needed to get done that day. I had typed up a To Do list and put each item on a separate page. DD was reading so she read them out loud - "eat breakfast", "brush teeth", "fly to Disney World". Both kids started jumping and screaming when we got to the last page. We've never seen them get dressed so fast! She told everyone on that trip how excited they were about being surprised.

 

[pad406]

We surprised the kids for the first trip (8&6 at the time). We normally do a movie night on Friday so I put on the Disney DVD planning one and we started to watch. Took them a while to figure it out but they were super excited. That was a little less than a week before we went.

The 2nd (10&8) time we went to NYC first, they thought we were just going for a long weekend. When we got to the Airport to fly home to Ireland, DW stopped at the gate for Orlando. At first they didn't believe us, but again were super excited.

This time (12&10) we won't tel them where we're going again, probably not flying direct so it'll take them a while. The best part is we're doing a 3 way split stay, BWI, HRH in Universal, then back to the BC. Each time we'll let them think we're going home. They haven't been to Universal so that will be a big surprise.

Our kids love surprises though, DD even put on her end of school letter that one of her favorite things was surprise holidays.

Hope your reveal goes well.

 

[Altoqueenkelly]

We surprised DD and DS for our first trip. We told them we were going to FL to the beach for a week. We drove down. We stopped at a hotel just a few miles from Disney for the night. We then packed up and headed to Disney, they saw all the signs.

I am sitting there with the camera and I'm going oh my gosh look at all the signs for Disney. DS says are we going there? I said yes we are going to Disney World!!

DD looks at me, but we are going to the beach still right? WHAT?! I shut off the camera, I was so upset LOL!

Once we got there she was fine and was very appreciative. We did go to the beach as well.

For our family, surprises aren't fun. So we have let them help plan this trip, they are so excited.

Ive learned its best to never tell them they are going somewhere else. It just adds confusion to the mix and they are stunned thinking why did you lie and/or are you serious/joking? Its better if they don't have a clue about a trip at all. Of course, its also better if they have BEEN to Disney before so they can actually understand how awesome it is. That's how you get the excited responses

 

[autismgoesdisney]

Ive learned its best to never tell them they are going somewhere else. It just adds confusion to the mix and they are stunned thinking why did you lie and/or are you serious/joking? Its better if they don't have a clue about a trip at all. Of course, its also better if they have BEEN to Disney before so they can actually understand how awesome it is. That's how you get the excited responses

I had to tell the kids we were going somewhere or else they would question where their clothes went and why the 3 dogs were at my aunt's house. I told them we were going to my sister in laws beach house and while they love the beach house, we can go there anytime.

 

[Disney Khaleesi]

Just be warned, you might not get very happy responses. Even at the age of 8, if anybody woke me up when I absolutely did not have to be up (school, etc) they better keep a 5 ft. distance from me because I am NOT happy camper in those situations.

If I were woken up at 3 AM, you can tell me I'm going to Disney, but I'm just going to go straight back to bed.

 

[momto3gr8boys]

We surprised the kids one time. They thought we were going to Six Flags and leaving very early. It was pouring rain when they got up, and they were about ready to cry when I told them it was raining to hard to go to Six Flags. BUT, since it's always sunny in FLorida, why don't we go to Disney instead!

They were incredulous, then super excited, then bouncing off the walls. They spent the entire plane ride down repeating "I can't believe we are going to Disney World". They were about 10, 8 and 5 at the time.

I will always enjoy that memory, but I don't think I will do it again. I love planning and planning in secret isn't as much fun.

I did surprise them with a Disney Cruise last year, but revealed it in an Easter egg hunt (which if you do the math on the above ages you will realize they were as confused about an Easter egg hunt as they were about the surprise lol).

Now I am trying to decide what to do about our February trip. This is their Christmas gift. The past few Christmases have gotten so out of hand with "stuff" no one really needs, but I'm just trying to feel like they got enough "stuff". So I decided we are going on February break, and this is everyone' major Christmas gift (I'll still get them a few things that they really want). But I'm going crazy not telling them...especially since we are going without them in November to run Wine and Dine (guilt, anyone lol??). So they see Disney stuff out - calendars, ADR lists, etc., but no one has a clue since they think it's just for our November trip. If I tell them now, it loses the impact of a Christmas gift. But if I wait, they miss out on most of the planning. Still trying to decide what to do....

OP, good luck with the reveal - I can't wait to hear how it goes!!!

 

[MissMaryQC]

When sis and I were little girls, about 7 and 10, my mother picked us up from school on a Thursday afternoon. Mama said she'd had a hard week, really tiring, asked us if we'd had a hard week too. Being little girls we said yes, we'd had such a long hard week, oh my goodness, yada, yada. Mama then suggests that we just go to Disney World; we live in Miami, so it's a fairly quick drive. We get all excited, "yeah! Let's go!" Basically knowing mama is pulling our leg. But she said "ok, let's go!" Once we hit I-95 north sis and I knew she wasn't bluffing. Mama had left work early and packed for us. It was really a great surprise; just a long weekend trip, but one I haven't forgotten, and I'm 30 now!

 

[Kae]

We surprised the kids one time. They thought we were going to Six Flags and leaving very early. It was pouring rain when they got up, and they were about ready to cry when I told them it was raining to hard to go to Six Flags. BUT, since it's always sunny in FLorida, why don't we go to Disney instead!

They were incredulous, then super excited, then bouncing off the walls. They spent the entire plane ride down repeating "I can't believe we are going to Disney World". They were about 10, 8 and 5 at the time.

I will always enjoy that memory, but I don't think I will do it again. I love planning and planning in secret isn't as much fun.

I did surprise them with a Disney Cruise last year, but revealed it in an Easter egg hunt (which if you do the math on the above ages you will realize they were as confused about an Easter egg hunt as they were about the surprise lol).

Now I am trying to decide what to do about our February trip. This is their Christmas gift. The past few Christmases have gotten so out of hand with "stuff" no one really needs, but I'm just trying to feel like they got enough "stuff". So I decided we are going on February break, and this is everyone' major Christmas gift (I'll still get them a few things that they really want). But I'm going crazy not telling them...especially since we are going without them in November to run Wine and Dine (guilt, anyone lol??). So they see Disney stuff out - calendars, ADR lists, etc., but no one has a clue since they think it's just for our November trip. If I tell them now, it loses the impact of a Christmas gift. But if I wait, they miss out on most of the planning. Still trying to decide what to do....

OP, good luck with the reveal - I can't wait to hear how it goes!!!

thats a good one!

Kae

 

[Pfau]

Not a last-minute surprise but we are giving it as their Christmas present. We will be there at the end of January/beginning of February. Our reservations, flights, and ADRs are made but they will have the pleasure of planning other stuff with me for a month.

I just hope I can keep my patience for the month of the "Is it time yet?" "How many more days?" "Can we go now?" questions. I will need to get a countdown calendar or something!

 

[autismgoesdisney]

When sis and I were little girls, about 7 and 10, my mother picked us up from school on a Thursday afternoon. Mama said she'd had a hard week, really tiring, asked us if we'd had a hard week too. Being little girls we said yes, we'd had such a long hard week, oh my goodness, yada, yada. Mama then suggests that we just go to Disney World; we live in Miami, so it's a fairly quick drive. We get all excited, "yeah! Let's go!" Basically knowing mama is pulling our leg. But she said "ok, let's go!" Once we hit I-95 north sis and I knew she wasn't bluffing. Mama had left work early and packed for us. It was really a great surprise; just a long weekend trip, but one I haven't forgotten, and I'm 30 now!

That is awesome!!! Lucky you living so close!