Day 825: The Crossword

First things first...Happy Easter everyone, even if I am writing this at almost 10 at night and Easter, for much of the world, is already over. Regardless, it's been a long day filled with Disney things, and you all know what today meant. That's right, Easter is when Mom decided Dad and the brother were finding out about our Disney Trip this June, meaning that they, as of now, finally know about this extra vacation that's thrown in to celebrate my parents' anniversary. 

Now...after all my talk over the past month and a half or so about this trip and how to tell them about it, I'm sure you're wondering how it all worked out. After a long period of time trying to figure out how to surprise them while kind of making them work for it, I came up with a crossword puzzle for them to figure out, which looked something like the following. Actually that's the crossword...it looks exactly like the following. 

This isn't the complete one, as the ones they worked on today also had specific letters boxed in that, when they unscrambled them, read "Walt Disney World June Sixth-Tenth." It took them what felt like an eternity to get all the answers...although they probably would have finished faster if they actually worked together instead of just sitting and copying off of one another every time one of them figured out a word. With a little help from me, it didn't take long to unscramble the letters though, and then the secret was out. 

Now, maybe they could have bee a little more excited about the whole thing. If it had been me I probably would have cried, although they are guys, so they probably wanted to appear more masculine or something. Either way, the crossword worked great, especially since some of the clues and words definitely had to do with the trip itself, such as "The Iron Spike Room," which led to "Wilderness Lodge," the resort at which we're staying. 

Other than that, my cousin made me this lovely present, which will have a place of honor in my bedroom at home since I unfortunately don't have that perfect place for it in my dorm room right now. Next year, on the other hand, I might be able to fit it in. Either way, I love it, and it's definitely just another way Disney appeared in my Easter Celebrations today! 

That all being said, I hope you had a lovely Easter! I'll see you all tomorrow! 

Have a magical day!

Day 818: The Big Surprise

We all love a good surprise, or at least most of us do. When it comes to Disney Trips, however, I've only really been surprised by one once: the day I found out my High School Band was headed to Walt Disney World for a performance and a workshop. I do, however, love watching surprises on YouTube where parents surprise their kids with a trip to Disneyland or Walt Disney World. I've talked about them before, and really, there are some creative ways of telling your family members about the trip, but trying to come up with those creative ways is a lot harder than it looks.

Then again...I'm also not surprising a couple of kids.

My mom and I, along with many of my friends and half the world at this point, have been carefully treading our way around telling my Dad and my brother for months now. It's gotten pretty close here and there...today, for instance, my friend Ashley was texting me and when she laughed, my brother asked to see her phone. I quickly texted something for her to laugh at that my brother would think normal (AKA Colin O'Donoghue spam...just tons of pictures, one after the other). He did, and luckily it put him off of the idea for a while. Dad's a bit easier to get around since I don't see him as much, but I've definitely had a few moments where I almost slipped up, mostly thanks to the slides of old Disney we've been looking at just about every weekend.

But now there's less than a week left until they find out. Mom told me initially that she was going to tell them on Easter, and that's not very far away, so we kind of have to come up with a plan on how to tell them. But, being me, I don't really want to do it in a classical way. We're not spending Easter at our house, which means we're not planning the Easter Egg hunt, and that makes for some problems right off the bat, and throws out the idea of an Easter Egg scavenger hunt to tell them. So Mom and I have spent some time this afternoon trying to figure out what to do instead and to be completely honest...I still have no idea.

Well...I didn't have an idea until just now. The thing is, when you're trying to surprise someone who's not a kid, you have extra things to consider. You can't just put together pictures of random things because if we did that, they'd have it figured out in a few seconds. No, you want to prolong the angst and the surprise...so how do you do that?

Ultimately, it took a while, but after searching through list after list of ideas, I think I've come up with the perfect idea: a Crossword. Now, I'm not finished with it yet and to be completely honest, I literally just came up with this idea about three minutes ago, so I still have a lot of work to do the rest of this week to figure it out. However, I'm pretty sure this is gonna be great, and I'll get back to you in a week to tell you how it all went down!

Which leaves me with a question for all of you: How would you surprise your family with a trip to Disney? Also, let me know if you have any fun surprise stories!

Have a magical day!

(Note: This blog post was written on March 30 due to Midterms).

Day 250: Work Hard, Play Hard

So, it has officially been over 12 hours since my band director told us that we're going to Disney World, and I'm starting to wonder if it's bad that I'm still crying. I just can't believe that this is actually happening. I am so proud of the band for helping me make this dream come true. It certainly wouldn't be happening without each and every one of them.

But as I was laying in bed this morning and listening to the confirmation recording for what is probably the 20th time, something occurred to me. Once and a while, when I'm having a bad day or am just missing Disney, I'll go and watch videos of families surprising their kids with a trip to Disney. I've talked about it before, and about how I can't wait to have that experience with my kids. I've always thought, for many years, that I would never have the opportunity to have a surprise like that. I go to Disney all the time, so my family announcing it is more of a "finally you picked a date for us to leave." But standing at that game last night, I feel like a video camera could have been there filming us for one of those commercials. I had no idea that was coming, and it was the happiest moment of my life. Obviously it is if I'm still like crying.

I have no clue how my band director came up with that brilliant way of telling us, but I am so glad that's how he decided to do it. There could not be a more magical and meaningful way for us to find out that we got accepted to march at Walt Disney World. Not a better way to tell me that my dream is actually coming true, the one that I, in all respects, thought would never ever happen. So I just want to thank him for that!

And you know what's even funnier? A few weeks ago I opened a fortune cookie, and you know what the fortune was? "Your fondest dream will come true within the next year." Looks like those things don't lie after all. That or you really can wish upon a star and your dream will come true. Whatever it was that made this possible, what made all the hard work we put in pay off, I want to thank that.

All I know is that I really hope someone has footage or pictures of that moment (I know someone does!). And that all the hard work that I put in, that WE put in, is finally paying off. As our director (and the recording from Disney) say, Work Hard, Play Hard. And now we get to do both at Walt Disney World.

Honestly though, I really do feel like we could be in this commercial, only instead it would be for Disney Performing Arts. I never ever thought I would get to have an experience like that, but I'm so glad that I did.  

For #Frumpstagram today the prompt was "Palm Trees," and if I'm being completely honest, I don't have a lot of pictures of palm trees. Probably because there really aren't a ton of them, but I did eventually manage to find a picture of one! It did take some looking though! 

And here's today's Disney History: 1994: Disney theme parks welcome their 1 billionth guest - Mary Smith from Illinois! After walking through the main gate of Walt Disney World, she is awarded a lifetime pass for her and her family and a cross-country flight to Disneyland. 

Have a magical day!

Day 8: Disney Vacation Surprises

I'm pretty sure that of all my pins on Pinterest about Disney, this is one of the most true.

I honestly can't wait for the day when I'll have my own kids and I can surprise them with their own trip to Walt Disney World. Of course, my family is going to have to be one that just loves Disney, because I wouldn't be able to survive forever without going to Disney World.

I've seen some pretty creative ways of people surprising their kids, and every once and a while when I had a bad day I'll go on Youtube and search for exactly that. Some people put it in pizza boxes, like the family on the Disney commercial, others surprise their kids when they come home from school. Sometimes it's a Christmas present surprise, and sometimes they go on scavenger hunts. It will be in the car ride, at home, at a friend's house or at the airport.

I actually have a friend who's family surprised her and her three siblings with a trip to Walt Disney World several years ago, and I believe they did it with a word scramble. All of this just goes to show that you can do this kind of surprise in any which way you please.

For me, I have no idea how I'll surprise my kids, and I guess that's for the future to know what I'll do, but currently I personally really like the idea of a scavenger hunt, as long as the kids are old enough. I just feel like it'd be something really cool to do. It makes a game of it. That or I'd arrange to have Mickey Mouse call our house, which I believe is a possibility out there, but don't quote me on that!

In other words, I can't wait to do this, and I know there are many others that feel the same way as I do. All I know is that someday there are going to be a lot of really happy children out there, and while I haven't explained it in detail, I'd love to see every child good to Disney World or a Disney park somewhere in the world, so they can have the same experience with the magic that I have.

Have a magical day!