So, we're headed back to Disney, the happiest place on Earth and it's this little critters first visit alone with Mom! Needless to say, she is incredibly excited; which was a wonderful thing until it wasn't...
You might ask: "How could her excitement be a bad thing?" and I would tell you that its not! But, the issue for little kids everywhere is their perception of time. No, we were not going tomorrow, or the next tomorrow or the last tomorrow... she was going to have to wait (at that point) 86 long days.
How could I help a 4 year old conceptualize 86 days when she could barely handle the week? Normally, I wouldn't have engaged her until much later in the process but because this was a special trip for just the two of us, I wanted her to be involved in making advanced dining reservations and choosing which parks and rides she would like to do.
We tried talking it out and we tried looking at calendars but none of it seemed to resonate with her. That's when I turned to the internet for countdown calendars and found an amazing place called The Purple Pumpkin Blog and her absolutely adorable Disney character paper chains. We printed them off right away and spent a great afternoon cutting and stapling the chain together.
IT WORKED!
We no longer have tears of frustration over how long until her special trip; we just have giggles at how quickly her chain is getting smaller and lots of excited hugs!