My husband and I already did a bit of traveling this year, so there will be no summer trip to Disney World for us, as we've done for the past two Augusts. My next Disney goal is to visit WDW during the various holidays that Disney does up so famously. So I am shooting for a trip this December for the Christmas season.
In order to do that, I've got to start saving up. I've received a bit of cash as gifts over the last few months which I'd stuck in an envelope, considering it as the start of a savings plan for this trip. Since I'm a big visual learner, I wanted to have a special piggy bank I could display to encourage me to save.
I first checked Etsy and found some adorable options for less than $10... which are completely worth it if you're not a crafty person...but I was discouraged by the idea of spending money in the effort to save up money, so I decided to try my hand at making something with [mostly] stuff I had around the house.
I started with an empty plastic jar (this one had jelly beans in it). I chose this particular one because it's plastic, it has a flat side (for ease of writing on it), and it has a black cap which I thought went with the color scheme.
I used this great trick for stenciling on a jar. Type out on the computer (in Word or similar) whatever you want to write on the jar and/or any images you want to use. I used the Disney font "Waltograph" (here for free at dafont.com) and some Mickey heads (found here on family.disney.com). I found all sorts of cute ideas for wording on Pinterest: "Mickey Money," "Disney Stache" (adding a little mustache to a Mickey silhouette!), or simply "Our Disney Trip," but I went with "Disney Dollars." Play around with the font size and print. Then, cut out your design and tape it steady on the inside of the jar, facing out. Now all you have to do is trace! I used a plain old black fine-point Sharpee marker that I had, but a paint pen would have worked very well, too. (Actually, if you're using a glass jar, you'll want to go with the paint pen. You could use a paint brush but I found a pen to be much easier to control.)
I was very happy with the finished product and it would have been cute as-is but I wanted to add a little color. The cap of my jar was a 1/2" thick, so I used a combo of 3/8" ribbon (red) and 1/8" ribbon (yellow) to glue around the cap using tacky glue. Now I didn't have the size ribbon in the colors I wanted around the house, so I went to my local craft store and bought just a yard of each for under $1 total. I measured how much I would need to wrap the cap, I lined the cap with tacky glue and affixed the red ribbon, and then beaded a bit of glue over the red to attach the yellow. Voila! You can search around Pinterest for some magical additions... gluing a tiny Mickey figurine on the top of the lid, tying a red polka-dot bow around the neck of the jar, or using vinyl lettering instead of a marker...but for me, these would have cost extra money, and personally, I'd rather throw it in the jar than use it to decorate the jar. (The $100 dollar bills, by the way, were gifts I received for various occasions....I found that if I received a gift in twenties, I'd spend it immediately but the three $100 bills stuck around on my desk waiting for deposit for a while.... so I think when I save up another hundred dollars, I'll go to the bank and ask for a single bill so I won't waste it on Starbucks!)
Whatever you come up with and whatever trick you use, it's a fun way to stash away some Disney cash for you and your family. I know there are lots of great sites out there with advice, like mousesavers.com... What are some of your ways to save for Disney?
