Disney is expensive! Why wouldn’t you want to maximize the magic of a Disney trip as much as possible?! We always start sprinkling pixie dust months before the trip. We make the itineraries, we make mousekeeping tip envelopes, and we pack pennies and quarters for penny presses. Every preparation adds a little more magic.
The drive from Tennessee to Orlando, Florida isn’t fun. It’s long, it’s boring, and there’s this inevitable funk that starts forming in the van sometime during day 2… You get the picture. To make the road trip a little more “Disney” we made survival boxes for each person during our last trip. It’s a simple project that adds tons of pixie dust to the trip!
Here’s everything you need: Scissors, Tape, a storage box with clear sides, and wrapping paper.
See, just a plain old boring box! You can generally find these at the Dollar General store for a few dollars. Naturally Wal-Mart always has them too. We used the shoebox size for this project since we were making one for each person to keep with them in the van.
The wrapping paper is a Dollar Tree find. Since we were going right after Christmas there were TONS of Disney prints! You can’t even tell this Ariel print is Christmas paper. $1 for a whole roll of The Little Mermaid? Yes, Please! We each had a different Disney paper print so we could quickly spot which box belonged to who. To line the box we cut long strips roughly to match the depth of the box.
Now put the paper around the inside of the box with your lovely Disney character facing the sides. Trim excess paper that might me sticking above the rim so the lid will snap shut with no problem. When it’s all trim, tape the paper to the sides. You don’t need to cover the entire edge, just a piece every few inches should do the trick.
The corner may seem intimidating, but don’t worry! Fold yourself a tight crease and add a piece of tape to keep it secure. Tape fixes everything here in the south!
In the end hopefully your box looks like this. See, I knew you could do it!
Now you have a survival box full of pixie dust! It’s easier to find things in than digging through a backpack and it’s not getting holes ripped into it or spilling like redneck suitcases (AKA Wal-Mart bags) tend to do on road trips.
What you fill it with is up to your crew. You could do crayons and activities for kids. It could be handheld games or DVD to pass time. For us we each had a snack box! This was genius because not only were snacks easy to find, but the hard box was keeping everything from being smushed in the bottom of bags. This also saved a ton of money at every convenient store between here at Florida! The boxes can hold a surprising amount. There were Juice Boxes, Poptarts, Nutella To Go, Apple Sauce, Children Salad kits, baggies of snacks… too much to list! We also put a bag of plastic spoons in each box.
Snap on the lid and you’re good to go. How cute is that? Definitely a lot more magical than than throwing things in plastic bags! But wait! There’s more!
Sprinkle a little pixie dust on top too! We added stickers but you could do so much on these! Add names, paint, glitter… let your imagination be your guide.
