How to give a surprise holiday as a present?

[sparkleandsleep]

I've booked a surprise trip to New York for dds big birthday as she's had a really rough couple of years. We fly two weeks after her birthday and I can't decide whether to tell her the full details on her birthday, tell her it's a weekend in London (we're staying there the night before our flight) then announce where we're actually going on the first morning or make some elaborate story up...
Advantages of telling her on her birthday is making sure she packs enough of the right clothes but I'd love to make it a huge surprise for her!
Any tips on how to make it really special for her would be gratefully received 😊

Tell her when you're at the airport.

Tell her London as it's basically the same packing wise, but check her passport now, too many threads here on out of date passports plus you need estas

How old is she? Does she need time off work etc?

Tell her on her birthday...the build up will be part of the pleasure.

You could do it in two parts....surprise 1...we're going to London for your birthday. We're only staying one night though.

Surprise 2.....BUTTTTTT, we're only staying one night, because we're going there on our way at to New York!

Have a great time!

She's still in school so it'll be her holidays so don't need to worry about time off work. I just want to make it special but am useless afraid kind of thing- passport was renewed this year thankfully!

Definitely tell her in advance. Half the fun is showing off to her friends beforehand, especially if she’s still young.

I think birthday - if she's quite young, a last minute surprise might be quite overwhelming and emotional for her. Better to let her enjoy the buildup and maybe do some research on where she would like to go in NYC. And she will want to pack her best stuff!!

Anticipation and researching are part of the fun, tell her in advance. Maybe you could make the destination a puzzle of its own?

Tell her before. It's exciting knowing you're going on holiday

So the consensus is to tell her in advance she's 16 and would definitely appreciate the chance to pick exactly what to pack so if I tell her on her birthday she will have time to do that, especially as it'll be cold when were there so she'll need plenty of warm clothes. Now I just need to find some way of telling her so she doesn't expect it!

What about literally giving her a big apple.

You could do a little box or treasure hunt of clues. E.g Hershey choc, new scarf, guide book, miniature toiletries etc

How about a series of clues starting on her birthday and leading up to the flight?

My DH bought me a trip to Venice a few years ago for Christmas and printed out pictures of various clues (maybe around 12 in total) that started more vague on xmas eve e.g. just a date and became obvious nearer the end of xmas day e.g. a picture of a gondola.

That way she gets to know there's a surprise present on her birthday and could have a new clue to look forward to each day that builds a picture for her. One could be 'pack warm clothes'. You could give her the final clue a day or so before so she can choose her bits to pack?

I took DH to New York for his 30th and engineered our engagement I initially wanted to make it a surprise and only tell him where we were going at the airport but we weren't flying for a few weeks after his birthday. In the end I found a large apple ornament and gave him that as his present with no other clues. He knew we were going away but it took him a few hours to actually get "the big apple" reference.
Looking back I'm glad I told him early it was exciting for him/us to make plans of where he wanted to go and look into what was on in NYC when we were going to be there.

We now have the apple ornament in the livingroom and people always ask "what the apple for?!"