I mentioned yesterday that we were in the final days of our 30 Day Disney Countdown!
Every parent that decides to take their kids on a trip to Disney World has to also make a decision about how to tell their kids. We debated between telling them in advance and doing a countdown or telling them on the way to the airport. On the one hand, I love watching the excitement of the kids who are learning at the last minute. On the other hand we thought it would be fun to build up the excitement for our kids, who have never been on a plane or been to Disney World before. We decided to go with the 30 day countdown idea.
Our 30 day countdown started out looking like this:
and today it looks like this:
Each day we have been peeling off a mickey and revealing what we will be doing that day and tomorrow we will peel off #3!! We are three days away people! After over a year of planning we are now just three days away!
My husband, Scott, has been working with me to make this past month a lot of fun for our kids as we prepare for our trip to Disney World. For the 30 days leading up to our departure we came up with one thing each day that we could do, make, play, or watch with the kids to get them excited for the Disney trip. Today I will show you some of the fun things we have been up to. I have shared the wording that is on the countdown chart in bold and then shared a few sentences of a more detailed explanation, along with some pictures. I hope that this is a fun post for others who are also planning a trip to Disney.
Day one: Disney Trip Overview.
This was the day we told them that we would be going to Disney World and we explained the poster we made that showed where we would be on each day of the vacation. We showed them the countdown poster and let them peel off the first mickey. Under the first mickey we said, “Disney Trip Overview” which doesn’t sound super exciting, but hey! you have to start somewhere, right? 🙂
Day Two: Magic Kingdom Tour.
The first few days were spent looking at videos on youtube to show the kids some of the places we were going to go to and some of the rides we could go on. Our kids have never been to Disney World so all of this was new to them. Scott liked the UndercoverTourist videos the best. He felt like the guy who makes these videos does a good job capturing each experience, and I happen to agree with him.
Day Three: Epcot Tour.
We watched more youtube videos and found pictures of the Epcot Center.
Day Four: Hollywood Studios Tour and Find comfortable walking shoes.
We watched some more youtube videos. By this point Keely was asking, “Are we just going to watch videos everyday?” … NO! Because today we are getting shoes too! YAY! 🙂
We explained to the kids that we would be doing a lot of walking so we needed good shoes and then we took them out to the store to get new tennis shoes. (This also worked well as the new school year was right around the corner and we wanted to get them new gym shoes anyway)
Day Five: Pick 5 Disney characters you really want to meet and write to one of them.
Scott actually made a list of the Disney characters that would most likely be there and let the kids circle the ones they were excited about.
Day Six: Caribbean Beach Resort tour.
Honestly, of all the videos we showed the kids, this was the video that got them most excited. They were all giddy about the pool! But who could really blame them?
Day Seven: Disney Gift.
We wanted to get the kids Disney t-shirts before we went there so we could save money. You can get Disney shirts for $3-10 if you go to places like Target or Walmart but they are much more expensive if you wait until you are at Disney to buy them. We had three “Disney gift” days on our countdown and we gave them shirts on each of those days. We used Rewards from credit cards to get gift cards to Target and Walmart and then we used those gift cards to buy them shirts. (I only mention this because it was one of the many ways we found to do fun things for the kids for really, really cheap)
Here is a $4 shirt we got from Target for Kipton:
Day eight: Look at pictures of Disney.
Scott showed the kids pictures of when he went to Disney in high school and then he got on facebook and showed the kids some of their friends who had already been there and posted pictures on facebook of their trip.
Day nine: Trip to the Disney store.
We knew the kids would want stuffed animals from the gift shops at Disney. Scott and I both got Disney credit cards that gave Disney rewards as you used them. We started using the credit cards for everything we bought for a few months to rack up some Disney reward dollars that we could use to buy some things at the Disney Store. We used those rewards to get each of our children a stuffed animal. We made a trip out to the mall this day and let them each pick one out. Of course, my nine year old picked Perry the Platypus. (we just can’t get enough of him) We decided we would take the stuffed animals with us on the trip so they could sleep with them in the hotel there.
Day ten: Mickey pancakes in the morning and Disney Karaoke at night.
I used bisquick mix to make pancakes in the morning. They weren’t anything fancy. Just three circles in the shape of a Mickey head. Kipton asked for chocolate chips so he could make a face on his and I let him.
For Karaoke Scott looked up the songs the kids liked on youtube and he connected the laptop to the TV so they could see the videos and hear the songs. We started out looking up “Disney Karaoke songs” and we found lots of videos that had the words on the screen but with no voices, just the music, (you know… karaoke) but our kids couldn’t follow along so we ended up just looking up the regular videos that did all the singing for you. It really ended up being more like a dance party. A crazy, out of control dance party. 🙂 The kids were all over the place. I mean, really, they were running up and down our hallway, leaping in the air, and our daughter was trying to do cartwheels. It was nuts, but it was fun.
Day 11: Search for the hidden mickey game
We printed off and cut out 100 mickey heads and we showed them to the kids and then sent them outside. Some of the mickeys had numbers on them: 10, 20, 50, and one of them had 100. If the mickey had a number on it it was worth that many points. If the mickey didn’t have a number on it it was worth one point. Some of the higher point ones were harder to find. Some were super obvious, which was also fun. If we put it too high for them to reach we told them to show us that they found it and we would get it down for them. We made sure that you could see at least part of each mickey so they wouldn’t have to open things or flip things over and all that. After they went on their mickey hunt we counted up all their points to see who won. We let the kids hide them for each other when we were done. The kids loved doing this and we got a kick out of watching them. I definitely recommend this one. Here are two of some of the more obvious hiding places we had: we had a Lego guy holding a mickey and we taped one to the window so you could see it through the curtain.
Day 12: Check out books at the library.
This one is self-explanatory. There are SO many books at the library. Here are some we found:
Day 13: Disney craft.
We made a 3D Perry the Platypus because our kids love Phineas and Ferb. We printed these off and made them but I ended up doing most of the work because it was kind of meticulous. I ended up getting out the hot glue gun so it would stay together. Here is the original picture:
and here’s what ours looked like:
Good enough. 🙂
Day 14: Coloring contest and Disney gift.
We printed off several different Disney coloring sheets and let the kids pick one. Whichever one they picked they colored and then we decided who did the best coloring. Nothing fancy here. Preston was our big winner. He really took his time and he was slightly bummed when he learned that the “winner” didn’t actually “win anything” other than bragging rights… (oops) Here is his masterpiece…
The kids also got more shirts this day.
Day 15: Disney trivia contest.
There are lots of Disney trivia games online. Scott came up with his own questions and I did these ones. The kids loved the last question. True or false: The official voices of Mickey and Minnie mouse were married to each other in real life.
Day 16: Play Disney Headbanz game.
This was a game we already had in our house. It’s silly. Scott is the master at this game! The kids and I had a hard time figuring most of these out so we ended up giving clues to each other to make it easier.
Day 17: Mickey waffles and play Toy Story Midway Mania game.
Mickey waffles were easy peasy. We made these using Eggo waffles and Eggo waffle minis, like this:
Scott was able to pick up the Toy Story Midway Mania game at Game Stop for about $10, because it is an old game.
Day 18: Play Disney Bingo.
Scott has made special Bingo cards for birthdays in the past so he kind of already knew what he was doing with this. He went ahead and made some Bingo cards with Disney characters and printed them off.
Day 19: Downtown Disney Tour
We showed pictures to the kids for this one. We just did a search and found lots of pictures online.
Day 20: Play Tigger and Pooh Word Find Builder game and Disney Candy Land.
These were games we already had in our house. The Word Builder game is meant for kids who are just barely learning to read (probably 3-6 year olds) but Preston was a good sport about it. The Candy Land game is a Princess game so the boys decided to use Mario characters as their pawns instead.
Day 21: Make Disney Craft and Get Disney Gift.
This time we made Mickey paper airplanes.
We couldn’t figure the instructions out so we just folded them however we wanted. The kids didn’t care. They had a good time anyway.
Day 22: Play Mickey’s Playground game.
This was a game I picked up at Goodwill for a buck and a half. It was crazy old and the box was all beaten up but our kids did not care. This game is definitely designed for younger kids.
Day 23: Play Disney Princess Cupcake game and make Mickey cupcakes.
Keely got this game for her birthday a long time ago so we already had this game too. Our kids really have fun with this game, even the boys.
The kids helped me make Mickey cupcakes, which was really just a cupcake frosted with an Oreo Thin and two mini Oreos on top.
Day 24: Disney movie marathon.
We let the kids each pick a movie to watch. We borrowed them from the library or we looked them up on Netflix. A couple we already had at home.
Day 25: Disney movie marathon #2 and eat Mickey ice cream.
We let the kids each pick another movie that we didn’t watch the day before and we used the mini Oreos from the cupcake day and made ears in the ice cream and then poured magic shell over the top. We cut a strawberry and made it look like a bow to turn Keely’s into a Minnie Mouse.
Day 26: Eat Monster, Inc. fruit snacks and come up with jokes for “Monsters Inc. Laugh Floor”.
We read a Monsters, Inc. book that we got from the library.
We ate Monsters, Inc. fruit snacks while we showed the kids this video (It’s an 11 minute video… we started it at the 8 minute mark) to help them understand what Monsters Inc. Laugh Floor was and why we were coming up with jokes:
If you start at 8 minutes into the video that will show the part where one of the monsters shares some of the jokes that people from the crowd came up with. When you are in the waiting area before you get into the show you can text a joke along with your name and where you are from and they might use it in the show. We encouraged the kids to help us come up with jokes, but we ended up just looking some up because it turns out we just aren’t that creative when it comes to jokes.
Day 27: Play Toy Story Memory Game.
This was another game I was able to snag at Goodwill.
If your kids love Frozen, you can print off Frozen Memory game pieces here, along with some other fun activity sheets.
Day 28: Decorate Mousekeeping envelopes.
Instead of “housekeeping” there is “mousekeeping” at Disney resorts, and let me tell you… there are CUTE ideas out there for setting out tips for the mousekeepers. A tip has to be clearly marked for a mousekeeper to accept it. Our plan is to have the kids decorate one envelope for each night we are there and have each one say, “Mousekeeping” on the outside so we can leave a little tip for the mousekeeper each day. (Scott felt this would be better than leaving one big tip at the end in case if we have different mousekeepers each day we are there) Check out these other cute ideas for leaving tips for the mousekeeper! (click on the picture to get to the site I found these at)
Day 29: Pack bags because tomorrow is the BIG DAY!
OH my goodness, oh my goodness!
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