I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it on here before, but we’re going to Walt Disney World (the Disney in Florida) this December! We’ve been planning a family trip with Michael’s family (parents, sister, brother, and sister-in-law) since last July. I absolutely LOVE Disney World. This will be my 5th trip and Michael’s 3rd. Even though he’s not a nut like I am, he really enjoys it too.
Since we’ve been married, we’ve joined the Disney Movie Club twice. So…it’s safe to say we have a lot of Disney movies. To celebrate our upcoming trip, we’ve decided to watch a different Disney movie every week leading up to the trip. I’m sure there will be some weeks we don’t get one in–especially around the time the baby comes–but we’re going to try.
I’ll post a little synopsis of our Disney night, and then I’ll give some ideas of what I’d do for a theme night with little kids. I can’t wait to have Family Nights someday soon, and I love planning things like this. I might also add a few things I like about each movie and/or fun facts. We’ll see.
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Snow White
Our Family Night:
- Watched the movie
- Cleaned the house (fun, right?!)
- Mini Foods in Sevens (Michael just ate normally, but here’s my plate. PS. Can you tell I was still having a hard time with foods?)
Other Family Night Ideas:
- Have the kids put on a talent show with dancing and instruments they make
- Make a treasure hunt for toy jewels
Thoughts/Fun Facts:
- I didn’t really like Snow White much as a kid. I didn’t like her high-pitched voice, and it just wasn’t one of my favorites. In fact, Michael and I had decided to not buy it. That is, until we went to Disney World in 2009. On our behind the scenes tour, we learned a lot about Snow White and decided we had to have Walt Disney’s first animated feature–actually, the world’s first full-length animated feature.
- Recently, I read in “The Vault of Walt” by Jim Korkis that Hollywood stars showed up for the premier because they had to. Many of them could be heard making fun of coming to an animated movie and talking about the absurdity of it all. When it was over, they gave Snow White a standing ovation! Also, many of them left with sunglasses on to cover their tear-streaked faces. It was safe to say that Snow White had accomplished more than anyone thought possible.
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Pinocchio
Our Family Night:
- Watched the movie
- Ate Homemade Pizza (see below for tie-in explanation)
- Played “2 Truths and a Lie”
2 Truths and a Lie Game–You have to guess which one of the other person’s statements is a lie. We decided to give 3 points for the first guess being correct, 1 for the second, and none for the third.
- One of my examples: 1) I wanted to be an artist 2) I wanted to be a nurse 3) I wanted to be a doctor. Correct answer: 3 is the lie.
- I ended up winning by 2!
Other Family Night Ideas:
- Make puppets and put on a play
- Let the kids have a grasshopper race (hop on all fours)
- Wish upon a star
Thoughts/Fun Facts:
- While we were watching Pinocchio, we decided to find out where the story takes place. Michael thought it looked like Germany, but I thought that the names were Italian and the clothes were Swiss. After much googling, we finally found that it takes place in northern Italy. So we brushed up on our geography and looked at a map of Europe. It turns out that northern Italy borders Switzerland, which borders Germany. Hm–you learn something every day!
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We made a list of all of our Disney movies (in order of original release date) and I tried to think of something to go along with each. I’m such a nerd for things like this, and I’m excited about our weekly Disney Nights!
I’ll be writing a Pre-Trip Report on the DISboards (www.disboards.com) later, and I’ll post the link here. I’ll also post an abbreviated list of our plans here once the trip gets closer.
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Q for You: What ideas do you have for different Disney Nights?
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–Staci
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Our Family E 
January 14th, 2012 at 9:24 PM
Fun! We absolutely adore Disney too: we took a “2nd Honeymoon” to WDW five months after we got married! I love the idea of a different Disney movie + activities every week leading up to the trip! And the behind the scenes tour?! Didn’t know about that! We will be doing that the next time we go!
January 14th, 2012 at 9:45 PM
I didn’t know yall took a Disney trip! We took one before our first anniversary too! It was so much fun just being there as a couple. It was the “Keys to the Kingdom Tour” at Magic Kingdom. It was amazing! We got to go backstage, underground to the Utilidoors, learn tons of facts, and see so many neat things. It was one of the highlights of our trip!
January 14th, 2012 at 9:56 PM
I love your themed movie nights! Like you, I’m not the biggest fan of Snow White. I don’t think Madison has even seen it! I’d love to start doing something like this leading up to our next trip (which will hopefully be this fall!).
By the way…I’m trying to re-start my blog, but I’ve set it to private. If you want to join, just send me your email in a private message on the Dis! I’m trying to get back on the boards lately too.
January 15th, 2012 at 2:00 PM
Hi Meghan! If you do these theme movie nights, let me know. It’ll be your first trip as a family of four! I would definitely love to read along on your blog. I’ll email you. Let me know if you do a PTR.
January 14th, 2012 at 10:27 PM
I’m so excited to have family fun nights as well! Of course, it’ll start off with just Howard and me, but I think the idea of having a meal related to the movie is really fun.
Make sure you post your DIS link when you start! I still have 2 TRs going that I haven’t yet finished. I want to finish one before starting the Disneymoon PTR, but life has just gotten so busy. I always think that it’ll be less busy when we’re married, but I know that’s most likely not going to be the case!
January 15th, 2012 at 2:03 PM
Check out whittakerwoman.com for her family night ideas. They’re so great! I’ll definitely put my link on here. I know–I’m subscribed to both of your TRs, I just haven’t been on in forever. YAY! You’re going to have such a great honeymoon and I’m so excited for you two to get married.
January 15th, 2012 at 7:35 AM
I LOVE your themed nights! You two are going to be amazing parents 🙂 I’m also extremely excited about your trip to Disney in December!!! How fun to be able to share it with your family – and a new little one! The hubby and I are going the end of February for the Princess Half Marathon – and our 5 year anniversary! SO excited! 🙂 (Almost 2 years is too long without a Disney fix…)
January 15th, 2012 at 2:05 PM
Aw, thanks Megan! I can’t believe your half marathon is coming up so soon. I still head over to your blog regularly, and I’ve loved hearing your training updates. When we decide to start training for ours (maybe next spring), I’ll have to get tips from you. That’s so exciting that you’ll be going so soon!
January 15th, 2012 at 10:55 PM
This sounds like fun!!! We did a countdown chain and it was so much fun taking one off each day. We booked our trip in Jan. last year and it passed so much faster than you can ever believe. Esp. with your pregancy and then the baby, time will just fly by! We went to WDW Dec. 15-22 and stayed at POR. It was the first time we’d ever been at Christmas and it was AMAZING!!! It truly will make you not to want to go anytime else. The decorations were just out of this world. My favorites were the Osborne Lights, Cinderella’s castle lights, and the gingerbread house at the GF. The entire atmosphere was just wonderful!. I can’t wait to follow along with your TR. Planning is half the fun!
January 17th, 2012 at 10:53 AM
I absolutely can’t wait. I’ve LOVED looking at people’s Christmas TRs since we were planning our first trip. Did you do a TR? I want to visit a lot of the Deluxe Resorts to see their decorations. I love Christmas Time and I love Disney World. I can’t even wait for them to be mixed! Let me know if you did a TR.
January 18th, 2012 at 3:43 PM
I didn’t do a TR. With two kids, a husband, work, and everything else, I just don’t have the time. I do love reading everyone else’s TR’s though! I read about a hundred before we went! It is amazing how much you learn on the DIS! We went to several of the deluxes and looked at decorations and ate at several too!
January 23rd, 2012 at 9:43 PM
I know–it helped SO much on our last trip! I’m going to have to look at a lot of Dec TRs for this trip. I’m hoping we can make it to a lot of them!
January 16th, 2012 at 11:32 AM
Fun!
Yay for a PTR! I’m going in October and I’m so excited 🙂
January 17th, 2012 at 10:53 AM
I saw your PTR today. HOW FUN!
January 16th, 2012 at 3:40 PM
Trivia I learned today had to share with you. So cute.
In 1991, Wayne Allwine, the voice of Mickey Mouse, married Russi Taylor—the voice of Minnie.
Enjoy the movie nights!
January 17th, 2012 at 10:54 AM
Really? I had no clue. Thanks so much for the trivia, J! We will. 🙂