How did you surprise your kid, spouse, friend, etc with a trip to WDW???

[WDWmazprty]

This has been talked about before, but I think its been awhile. Let us know how you surprised a loved one telling them that they were going to WDW. There are a number of YouTube vids that show different ways people have done this. How did you do it, or even better, how WILL you do it in the near future????:sohappy:

 

[zurgandfriend]

I learned the hard way not to spring a surprise WDW trip on anyone and I know too many horror stories in regards to surprising people as well.
For examples;
A co-worker planned a trip to WDW but told his kids there were going to Hershey Park. The kids told all their friends that they were going to Hershey Park. The kids never caught on that they were going to Orlando until they drove under the WDW arch. The kids were not mentally prepared for WDW and lost it and cried that they didn’t want to go to Disney they wanted Hershey Park. It took the kids about 3 days to get into a “Disney” frame of mind.
Cousins of mine did a similar thing, they told their son he was going to Texas to visit relatives and when they got on the plane they told him they were really going to WDW, again the kid was not prepared for WDW and lost it. There’s nothing like a 2 hour plane ride with a crying child, unless it’s a 3 hour plane ride with a crying child, but I digress.
And finally;
I surprised DW with the money for a deluxe trip in 2009; she wasn’t expecting it and said NO I don’t want to go! She wasn’t mentally prepared either. I was going to make plans for a father & son trip when 4 days later DW said okay I think I do want to go. I thought after 4 previous trips she would be open to a surprise trip but that wasn’t the case.
Before our first family trip when DS was 7 year old, DW and I sent for the vacation planning video, the 3 of us watched it together then DW and I said “boy would we like to go there!” when DS said me too! We said okay let’s go.
We then explored Allearsnet for the resort slideshows and menus and together we picked where we wanted to stay and where to eat. We let DS be part of the decision making process and I highly recommend that approach went people ask me.
Okay I’ll get down from the soap box.

 

[MattyFresh]

Yeah, my wife is not as into Disney as I am......go figure. I don't think I could even think of trying to pull off a surprise trip, I would get some kind of response like....."Why aren't you taking me somewhere tropical if you were going to surprise me?"

 

[loveofamouse]

My oldest has always complained that we never go to Disney for HER bday. My son's bday is march which just happens to be tax season so we go for his bday. Anywho

Just this past Dec, we decided we'd surprise her with going for 2 days including MVMCP. It was her birthday party. So I made clues and hid them all over the house with each clue leading to another clue. The final clue lead to a HUGE box. The box was wrapped. She ripped into the box....only to find a small note card. The note card had a rhyme saying she was going to Disney World in 3 days for her birthday. Well, she tossed the card down and proceeded to play with her other bday gifts. No reaction. In fact, when we tried to get more of a reaction, she cried(she's 6. thinks she's 16).
So I turned to my, then, 4yr old son and said we are going to Disney. He screamed with glee. Now, we all know if you want a reaction, go to him, not her. lol

 

[bamillerpa]

We had always told our kids that we would be going back to Disney but wasn't sure when. We decided to take the kids out of school but not tell them. We contacted the school, told them that it was surprised, and got their homework and the permission that we needed. The night before we left we made sure the kids were asleep and then packed all of their stuff and packed the car. The kids woke up and came out for breakfast where we had made Mickey Mouse pancakes. These were served on Disney Character paper plates. We then told them both that we had received notes from their teachers and told them that we thought they should see them. The kids were getting a little bit panicky now which was actually kind of fun. We handed them each a note from their teacher who had written a note about keeping up with their work while having a fun time in Disney World. It took a moment but the older one finally put it all together. I think he was actually more excited about missing school but once he explained to to his little sister that we were actually going to Disney she was ecstatic! She ran back to pack and couldn't believe that everything was done and in the car. She actually sat in the car waiting for us while we cleaned up breakfast and finished getting ready.

 

[LoriMistress]

I think it may be best if you give people at least 3-7 days before your arrival date to inform the person(s) of the surprise trip to WDW. There are many reasons (like not being prepared for it, they might want to pack for their own luggage, etc.) Some tweens-teens prefer a few days to pack their own clothes. Bottom line is that YOU would know how this person would react with a shotgun trip. My DH has thought about springing a trip to DLR without telling me until we got there, but he knows me well enough that I enjoy planning our trips. Sure, I wouldn't mind being there, but I like to have the time to "get in the mind frame" and at least, do a bit of planning instead of "winging it."

 

[mickeysshoes]

Last trip my kids knew we were going...we normal always leave on a Sunday...4am to get to the airport for first flight out! Well after checking into flight into i was cheaper to fly out Saturday and book rooms for 1 night at same resort. So what i did was make this note for them.
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl...vG7fgG&sa=X&oi=image_result&resnum=2&ct=image
August 15, 2009

How would you celebrate if I told you we were leaving today for DISNEY instead of tomorrow??
Well guess what…START CELEBRATING RIGHT NOW!!!!! (insert here the confetti balloons for the balloons flying out of this envelope like on the commercials)
We have a 2:30 Southwest flight out of Dulles and Dan and/or Sally will be here at NOON to pick us up.
We have dinner plans for Paradiso 37 for 8:30 in Downtown Disney.
So get up, shower, and finish packing so we can put the YELLOW TAGS ON!!!!
Dad and/or I will be taking Hunter at 8:45 in case we are not here when you get this!!!

Mickey here come the HILLEARY’S!!!!
I put the letter inside an envelope with a entire package of confitti balloons to try to duplicate the commerical (from last year when someone would open the envelope and the balloons would fly out) and labeled witht he kids names and DO NOT OPEN TILL BOTH ARE AWAKE, i had to creap to the basement and leave it where the youngest would find it and wake up her sister. When they opened it all you could hear from the basement was screaming..."we are going TODAY????" They had 4 hours to pack and get ready to leave. They could not beleive we had not told them.
Then once there one morning i slipped another envelope under their door with the same kind of letter.


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[luvlifeinfl]

Our 1st trip to WDW 2005, DD's 5yrs & 15yrs at the time, we planned our trip 45 days proir to arrival, never told either of the girls we were going to WDW, we told them we were taking them to the the Beach & Bush gardens, during the process of packing I was about to bust with keeping the secret, so the night of leaving I called my oldest in the room and said I had a really big secret and she could not tell her younger sister, the response I got was Oh God mom your not pregnant, go figure preteen.I then told her we were going to WDW, she was not sure if I was telling the truth so I showed her our reservation paper work and she was so excited.

Well we drove all night and considering the 5 yr does not catch on quickly when we got on I4 driving towards the resort and my 5 yr old started seeing the bill boards she looked so confused, so we said we actually was going to Disney, she still was confused, even arrivng at the resort it had not set in, taking the ferry over to the MK after checking in she kept looking to me for assurance, but once we came around that bend and she could see the castle the excitement for her was so much. Then that walk onto Main St. PRICELESS!

For me it worked out keeping it a secret and it gave me so many moments of Pricless expressions on their face.

Thanks for letting me share.

 

[ThinkTink721]

We are trying to do that this year (surprise the kids).
It is hard though (keeping it a secret).
We keep talking about how it will probably be years before we are able to go back.
We are planning to drive this year instead of fly, so maybe that will throw them off.
I hope we can pull it off!

 

[MattyFresh]

We are trying to do that this year (surprise the kids).
It is hard though (keeping it a secret).
We keep talking about how it will probably be years before we are able to go back.
We are planning to drive this year instead of fly, so maybe that will throw them off.
I hope we can pull it off!

How old are they, maybe you could find something to keep them occupied for the ride. I know when we were little our parents would always have the interstate bingo games or something planned to keep us busy when we were awake. Maybe that would help distract them on the trip down.

 

[loveofamouse]

How old are they, maybe you could find something to keep them occupied for the ride. I know when we were little our parents would always have the interstate bingo games or something planned to keep us busy when we were awake. Maybe that would help distract them on the trip down.

It IS hard keeping the secret!

One game we played was Spot the Plate. We would look for outta town plates for whatever state we were in(i.e. driving through NC don't yell out NC plates lol). It was fun cause you'd just be watching traffic HARD to be the first to spot a plate and it never got old. We did it even driving around our own town. To this day, I can't help but glance at plates. Now, I can name just about every state from the plate without seeing the name. Learn a bit of history/state culture too

 

[G-bone]

We had our 2 boys do a scavenger type hunt around the house finding multiple envelopes with clues and maps to other locations throughout the house. Each location had another sealed envelope with they were not to open. Once they had 5 envelopes the said you can open one and that will be the family vacation for this year. We said inside each one is either a Wisconsin Dells weekend, a Disney trip, Six Flags for a weekend, and 2 other lame trips we made up. We mixed up the unmarked envelopes and let them think about which one to choose. The best part was every envelope had Disney as the choice so they won no matter what they picked. Was kinda fun.

 

[ob1thx1138]

We are taking our first family trip to Disney June 26th. Our 16 year old knows about it but our 8 year old has no clue. The 16 year old is going on a cruise with his grandmother and we are going to meet them at St. Augustine on the 24th. So our 8 year old just thinks we are going to drive down there (from Kentucky) to get him and spend the next day at the beach and seeing the fort (which we are actually going to do) the night of the 25th we have tickets for Medieval Times in Kissimmee so that gets us close. That night we are staying right down the road from Medieval Times. As far as the 8 year old knows we are going to get up the next morning and drive home. Actually we will be checking into Port Orleans Riverside for 7 nights spending 8 days in the parks. I am considering making an envelope and leaving it where he can find it the morning we check into POR telling him"go to these coordinates ****" then we could have him put that into the GPS and have it take us to a fast food restaurant for breakfast then have my wife slip another note into his hashbrown wrapper or something that says go here ***** which would take us to POR. I am not sure on that, maybe we will just drive to POR and let him figure it out on his own, either way, I can't wait to see his face when he finally realizes that he is going to WDW for the first time.

 

[DizneyPryncess]

My 5 year old nephew is going to Disney this summer. He knows about it already, but I've been doing something fun to help him get excited for it. I guess you could also do it to surprise someone too.

When I was in Disney in May, I bought 4 postcards. Then I went to Mickey's Mart in Downtown Disney, where everything is under $10. I stocked up on little Disney toys that he'd like. Now, every few weeks, I sent him a package. It includes a postcard that I write from Mickey Mouse & some little toys/candy that I got. Each one tells him how much closer his trip is, and how excited Mickey is to see him.

He loves to get the packages. I use the Mickey Mouse bags at the post office, so he knows what they are when he sees them and gets excited.

 

[Courtney1188]

My parents once did a 'surprise' vacation...we knew we were going on vacation, but we didn't know where. But they had the opposite problem, which was that it was NOT Disney World. I was 10 and had been to Disney 2 or 3 times, and the second that car got on I-75 NORTH instead of South, I was a pretty ed-off 10 year old. They took us to Niagara Falls and NYC, and I spent the whole time whining about how right now we could of been riding Space Mountain, watching Fireworks, etc.

 

[kashmir]

Yeah, my wife is not as into Disney as I am......go figure. I don't think I could even think of trying to pull off a surprise trip, I would get some kind of response like....."Why aren't you taking me somewhere tropical if you were going to surprise me?"

Offer her the Poynesian!!

 

[Tenny317]

This was done to me as a small child ha. I am a HUGE Disney freak and my family and I went once a year to every 3 years, it depends. So it had been awhile since we had gone and I was watching some tv in the den. My mom then called me from the kitchen saying we had appitizers before dinner. I was very confused by this and kind of got tiffed about having to get up haha. I get into the dining room and there is a plate on the table without food but Disney tickets! I was very confused for a minute not getting why there was no food on the plate but paper. Your mind kinda gets tricked when someone tells you something and then you are surprised with Disney tickets! My parents sure did trick me!

 

[kerrie]

How funny we got back from this very trip last month. We wanted to surprise our kids dd2 ds 4 and they where very. my kids wanted to go on a plane like daddy so we said we would take them on a plane ride. well we got up got to airport like we said now they assumed we would coem right back. as we are now at MCO walking past tons of disney related things kids didnt evam notice. my son goes mommy where are we? i said ask this Gentalman where we are. so he did and the guy said your where the guy your holding lives Now to a four year old that was like saying HUH. so he asked the next CM he goes excuse me where am I going she said you dont know where your going ? He said no she looked at me for the ok and said Well YOUR GOING TO SEE MICKEY MOUSE. My son and his sisters face lit upi and huge smailes. alothough it didnt set in until we got to our hotel and he goes mommy we are where micky lives. LOL

 

[Sassagoula]

I think you have to be very careful when surprising someone with a trip. As several other posters indicated, a lot of little kids don't cope with such major changes of plan well. They're expecting to see Grandma, the beach, or whatever, not WDW. I remember that even as a small child I would get so excited about the trip months in advance, and the anticipation was fun. Even as an adult it's great to have such a treat to look forward to. I think giving the person some advance warning (weeks, not minutes!) to look forward to and prepare for the trip is a much safer route and everyone will be happy. After all, a trip to WDW is still a trip to WDW!

 

[Raven66]

I would be so flipping happy if my husband would surprise me with a trip!!:lol: