Creative ways to pass the time until our next trip!

[Tigerlily125]

Our DD7 and DD5 and bursting with excitement for our upcoming trip (as are we)! I am trying to come up with creative things they can do to gear up for the trip. So far, they have been watching youtube videos of rides and attractions, started making character autograph books and we are going to work on making travel journals. Any other creative ideas of things they can do over the next couple of months?

 

[nursejackie]

Have fun looking for must-have snacks in each of the parks by checking out Disboards or Disneyfoodblog. We love doing this as snacks change between trips and we don't want to miss anything new so making a list helps us remember what we wanted, in the midst of all the excitement! We all like different things so this way everyone gets to try stuff they have chosen.

 

[Tigerlily125]

great idea!

 

[siestakeys04]

When my kids were younger we planned who was going to sit with who on what ride. They had a DVD player in the car so they picked out movies for the ride down. Looking at resort pictures also.

 

[jvz82]

We watched lots of Disney movies! There are so many older ones that my kids hadn't seen, and some of them are movies that rides are based off of so it was fun for them to have seen the movie before going on the ride.

 

[glassslippergirl]

Make collages of the things they really want to do, see, eat. Maybe the collages could even become the covers of their travel journals.

 

[PollyannaMom]

I second watching some of the movies!


Sometimes we do Mickey-shaped food to get excited, too.


Do you have a countdown calendar? Those are always fun. We've done everything from paper chains to a little mini chart stand with flip-over numbers. You can use a chalk board or whiteboard, recycle one of those Advent calendars with the little boxes, there are so many ideas!


Having the kids decorate tip envelopes for Mousekeeping is a nice crafty project too.


If you're going to Epcot, definitely find a map and show them where the countries they'll be learning about are! (Maybe even read a little bit about them.)


I also love that you're making journals! I still have them from our old trips, and it's so fun to read them!! We've done dated diary-style ones, but also ones that came with questions, like:

My usual bedtime is _____. During my trip, the latest I went to bed was _____. The earliest I got up was _____.

If you are doing one like that, you could have them make predictions now and then see if the real answers match.

(Other things to include, after the trip, are - favorite ride, favorite restaurant, something that was different than what they expected, hotel and room number, funniest moment, what ride they would invent next if they worked there...)

 

[Maggie at the Fort]

We love the countries in Epcot so before a trip we usually take a week for each country. We look it up on the map, listen to music from that country, color the countries flag, watch a related Disney movie if we can (Think Alice in Wonderland or peter pan for the United Kingdom or the Snow White for Germany) and we usually cook up a big meal related to that country. My kids also love doing chores for quarters that go into their disney banks (which were just repurposed nice shaped boxes that we put disney stickers on). Right before the trip, we play "bank" and change all the quarters for paper money and they have that to spend on souvenirs on the trip.

 

[photophreak]

I'm going to make THIS with my boys when we hit the 1 month mark. I'm trying to think of lots of ways to make the trip extra special + fun, even in the time leading up to it. (You can see more in my PTR.)

We have been having fun watching vlogs of disney trips- my kids now want to make one while we're there... not sure how I feel about that. haha!

 

[Tigerlily125]

I'm going to make THIS with my boys when we hit the 1 month mark. I'm trying to think of lots of ways to make the trip extra special + fun, even in the time leading up to it. (You can see more in my PTR.)

We have been having fun watching vlogs of disney trips- my kids now want to make one while we're there... not sure how I feel about that. haha!

The vlogs are such a great idea!

 

[Tigerlily125]

If you're going to Epcot, definitely find a map and show them where the countries they'll be learning about are! (Maybe even read a little bit about them.)

I love this idea. We love Epcot but in the past I have struggled to figure out a way to explain the meaning behind it -- the time leading up to our trip is a great opportunity to find the countries on a map and learn about them. Thanks!

 

[dsnycrzy]

Do weekly or bi-weekly movie nights.

This was Great Mouse Detective.


We are going to Universal Studios as well so this is Harry Potter.


Super Heros Party


Tangled!


We are Doing Sea World also and my son loves Whales so...


Moana


At 100 Days out we did Mickey Mouse clubhouse.

We do a simple party every Saturday or Sunday and every benchmark like 75, 50,25 and 10 days.

 

[5stljayhawks]

Check for local disney stores!!! they have summer events, also great way to live the magic while note in the park. make sure cast members are aware of pending trip!!

 

[sunflowerfields]

We had a Disney themed Halloween party at our home last year. A big hit was a "hidden Mickey" game. My husband and I hid Mickey heads ALL OVER. There were more than a hundred. The kids are still finding them. A few of the things we used were: one quarter and two dimes for the head-this was on the bathroom sink. my husband made one of barb wire which he hung up high on the side of the house, a paper one with just half the head and both ears showing was above a door in the hall. This one they just recently noticed. On the snack table we placed two small plates for ears along with a bigger one for the head and put the veggies on it. We used small rocks to make the head and ears and placed it on the waterfall rocks on our little pond. These are just a few examples. We made both easy and hard since we had a large age range of friends. Everyone had a ball searching. I am so far behind the times though-I made out score cards and had pencils laid out for everyone to use. Ummmmm....no, everyone just snapped a picture with their phones. It worked great that way. This might be fun for your children to help get ready. Also would like to say now they see hidden Mickey's on their own. Like for instance the other day my granddaughter brought a rock to me which was split open and looked like Mickey head in it.

 

[TinaLala]

Before each trip we usually watch park movies - Dumbo, Toy Story, Cinderella, Beauty/Beast, Mickey Mouse shorts, Potc, bugs life, etc. then we make food like the grey stuff, churro, Rice Krispie Mickey shaped dipped in chocolate, etc. sometimes we will have movie themed dinners - see threads. Or we will make park tshirts. Play guess where I am in the theme park - we give three hints and you have to figure out where we are. We might take out all of our Disney themed games (clue, monopoly, scene it, apples to apples, toy story mania Wii game, Disney universe).

We do a lot of these things often so when we really want to get excited we watch the planning videos!