Surprising Toddlers with a WDW Trip

[Courtney Harlow]

What is the best way you surprised your toddler with a trip to WDW? I'm afraid if we tell her too early, she will ask every single day! I'm looking for some close to departure cool ways to tell her. Thanks in advance!

 

[Moushe]

How old is she? She may not really "get it" enough to be surprised. My son is 2.5, when we watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse I tell him we are going to see Mickey in X amount of days. He gets very excited and starts jumping up and down saying "Mickey! Mickey!" but promptly forgets about it, lol.

 

[Courtney Harlow]

Haha. Yea that would be the case with my youngest, although she loves some Mickey Mouse Clubhouse! I'm not worried about her. It's my oldest who will be 4.5 and she doesn't forget a thing!

 

[Jarmo]

Out of curiosity, I just tried with my 20 month old:

"We're going to see Mickey in one month."
"OK, bye Daddy"

 

[Thing 1]

I was thinking a two year old.....four and a half is much easier. We did a last minute trip when our youngest was just that age. We told him a few days after we booked just because I wanted to tell him in a fun way. He already knew WDW so that was different. I got him the WDW book for kids and get us all a bunch of t-shirts and other WDW things. It was right before Christmas so we let his elf tell him by writing a note telling him we were going. We made a 20 day count down chain and that was fun once he got that taking off more than one a day, would not make it come quicker! It was such a fun age to go.

 

[TravelingTotMom]

My cousin purchased her daughters small suitcases with their favorite Disney characters, put their magic bands inside, and wrapped them up. When they opened them, she told them the suitcases were to pack up their stuff to go to Disney World.

Have you taken your kids to Disney before? We have this old Disneyland Fun Disney Sing-a-long tape that shows the actual characters (it's definitely dated and filmed in Disneyland - not Disney World - but there are similarities). Maybe you could watch that and then say you are going to go meet those characters at Disney World. Then both of your daughters will be familiar with the characters (not as cartoons) ahead of time.

Be warned though - you may get sick of it! Last night my 15-month son watched it 3 times in a row. I tried to put on a different sing-a-long after the second viewing, and he adamantly said "No! No... No... No... No... No!!!!" He then pointed at the DVD player and yelled "On! On! On!!!" until I put the correct sing-a-long back on.

We are going in Oct. and have ADRs at Garden Grille. I told DS we are going to eat dinner with Chip and Dale, and every time he sees them in the video now he gets a huge smile and goes "Eat! Eat!"

 

[MommyMeNDisney]

My cousin purchased her daughters small suitcases with their favorite Disney characters, put their magic bands inside, and wrapped them up. When they opened them, she told them the suitcases were to pack up their stuff to go to Disney World.

Have you taken your kids to Disney before? We have this old Disneyland Fun Disney Sing-a-long tape that shows the actual characters (it's definitely dated and filmed in Disneyland - not Disney World - but there are similarities). Maybe you could watch that and then say you are going to go meet those characters at Disney World. Then both of your daughters will be familiar with the characters (not as cartoons) ahead of time.

Be warned though - you may get sick of it! Last night my 15-month son watched it 3 times in a row. I tried to put on a different sing-a-long after the second viewing, and he adamantly said "No! No... No... No... No... No!!!!" He then pointed at the DVD player and yelled "On! On! On!!!" until I put the correct sing-a-long back on.

We are going in Oct. and have ADRs at Garden Grille. I told DS we are going to eat dinner with Chip and Dale, and every time he sees them in the video now he gets a huge smile and goes "Eat! Eat!"

Too cute!!!

 

[kwdw]

By toddler - I'm guessing 2-3 yo?

Not sure it matters unless you need to prep for first plane flight, or sleeping in a hotel room, or something unless. Too little. Maybe with a 3.5-4 year old they would understand more and are more familiar with characters. Maybe start a couple weeks out.

If you mean 4-5 yo - then I'd start prep a couple weeks out. Get them involved in packing and learning about rides, watch favorite Disney movies, see if you can get them to say what characters they want to meet.

 

[andiraye]

We made a countdown calendar and everyday my kids cross the day off. It helps them visualize the time. It worked when my DS was 3.

We've surprised the kids with a letter from Mickey inviting them to wdw. It didn't go terribly well as DS 7 got worried about the plane. But I don't think any other type of reveal would have been better.

 

[myrtleturtle]

We are going in October, so we talk about it all the time. I show them videos on Youtube of rides and restaurants to help them get familiar with the big characters. They see me making their shirts and things. Every kid is different, and my son needs a lot of time to process things or else it's a fight to get him to do it.

When we get 5 wake ups away, I will make a paper chain for them to tear off. Most toddlers don't have a clear concept of time, so anything longer than 5 is hard for my two.

 

[Ladygoldenhair]

How old is she? She may not really "get it" enough to be surprised. My son is 2.5, when we watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse I tell him we are going to see Mickey in X amount of days. He gets very excited and starts jumping up and down saying "Mickey! Mickey!" but promptly forgets about it, lol.

This was my dd too. She went for her 6th birthday and I asked her about the trip last week and she never remembered it. When she was 10 she knew she was there before but had not recalled anything more than she was there. The one at age 2 1/2 never exsist end in her memory ever. But, it surprised me she had no recollection of the trip at 6 years old.
I thought for sure she remember that one because she was adamant not to meet characters, no Presidents Hall, no scary rides. She was at universal that year too and remembers nothing. It was a miserable trip that everything scared her.

So the earliest trip memory was her 10 th Birthday mini trip. No details, but she reme being there and it was a really great place. We were mostly at Universal, a four day pass and two days unused tickets to Disney from the prior trip. As a parent I remember all the trips.

 

[travelgirl06]

We are doing a countdown calendar. ODD just turned four and we gave her a big box with treats for the trip (sunglasses, Princess dress, autograph book, etc.) and the calendar for her birthday and explained we were going as the big reveal - no reaction (other than "oooh I like these sunglasses"). A few nights ago when putting the daily sticker on her calendar it sunk in. Now she runs around squealing "when the calendar ends we're going to Disney World!" And she keeps telling her 1.5 year old sister who has no idea what any of it means ;-)

We gave the calendar about a month out, which seems like a good distance (although...ask me in three weeks). Each night she puts a sticker on it and we look at how many days are left. I've also marked other fun things on the calendar (birthday parties, special events, etc.) to give her intermediate stuff to look forward to. We've enjoyed watching you tube videos, reading books and discussing which rides she wants to do, etc.

 

[marinejjh]

We told our kids we were going to visit our relatives and then showed them the autograph book when we were at the airport.

 

[ForeverAlice]

Fill a box with mickey/disney balloons,wrap it with disney paper and let your child unwrap it!!! Then you can say we're going to WDW!!!

 

[AshleeH]

Keep expectations low. If this is a first trip, I would wait on the surprise and include her in the planning. They have no idea what they're being surprised with, aside from a general idea that they have from 30 second commercials. I'm taking my daughter on a trip, just her and me, when she's just shy of 4 and I plan on having her help me to get her excitement up.

We've surprised our kids with three separate trips. The second one (at 10 and 7) was a trip to Disneyland - the response was so lackluster that I deleted the video. And these are kids that had been to WDW three times in the years prior, so they knew the basics of where we were (they got more excited when they got into the parks and they still talk about the trip weekly now). The surprise this summer was the biggest yet - a DCL cruise to Alaska - I told them no more surprise trips. There's no way I can top that one and it's stressful for me to hide it . The reaction was great though - we kept it a secret until we walked out the doors at the parking garage and they saw the Disney ship and we told them how we were getting to Alaska. They knew where we were going, just not how we were getting there and they've been asking for a Disney cruise for years - that's the best video I have.

Like I said, just keep expectations low. The first surprise trip we did was to WDW in 2011 (youngest son was 5 at the time). We were able to keep it quiet until we saw the Disney sign over the road. We had just been there on our first trip the year before and told the kids to look up and see where we were spending the week. The oldest got really excited - the youngest whined that he thought we were going to a hotel .