Grandma Took the Grandkids to Disney Without Asking. Reddit Says She Wasn’t Wrong. Do You Agree, Floridians?

You leave the kids with a grandparent for a few days before you fly off to Mexico for vacation.

Would you be okay with the grandparent taking your kids to Disney for the day?

Here’s how one grandmother’s family reacted about the Florida day trip, and why many Reddit commenters didn’t fault her.

Note: This is general information, not legal advice. Child restraint rules are subject to change, so confirm the current requirements with the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles.

A Babysitting Request

The grandmother put her post on Reddit’s popular AITA forum, where people ask strangers to judge whether they were in the wrong.

Fox News Digital covered the post in March 2024, and its report is the main source for the family details below.

Her post says the kids’ ages were 5 and 4, with the babysitting job lasting five days and four nights.

The parents, she writes, went to Mexico for a wedding and added a few vacation days.

In her telling, she hesitated over the length of the job and agreed after her son got upset.

Then came Epcot.

According to her post, a birthday invitation arrived for a party at Epcot.

In follow-up comments, she said the park is about two hours from her home and the trip didn’t need a hotel stay.

By her account, it was the kids’ first visit.

She says it never crossed her mind to ask either parent first.

A Family Dispute

In her post, the Epcot day became a family fight once her son and daughter-in-law found out.

She describes her daughter-in-law as furious and in tears.

The post adds that her daughter-in-law accused her of taking away one of the kids’ milestones and called her entitled.

She writes that the label rankled because her daughter-in-law had pressed her for babysitting in the past.

If you had just given up five days to help, that word would be a hard one to hear.

In her version, her son wanted an apology, but she declined and asked the couple to leave.

A second request from him, she says, got the same answer.

As she tells it, her son then urged her to post the story on Reddit, sure that strangers would show her where she went wrong.

So she did.

Her question to the forum was whether she was out of line for taking the kids to Disney before their mother ever could.

Reddit’s Verdict

Of the roughly 7,000 replies to the grandmother’s post, most called her not in the wrong and blamed her son, Fox News Digital reported.

The most-upvoted reply hoped the episode would teach her son some humility.

A forum can hand you a verdict, but it can’t tell you how the parents feel.

Before you pick a side, remember that the thread was judging her version of events.

Supporters, as Disney Dining rounded them up, described the babysitting request as emotional pressure on a grandmother who had hesitated.

They argued that the couple can still take the kids to Disney themselves.

Some added that memories made with grandparents matter just as much.

She told Fox News Digital she was pleased with how people responded, and that her son had read the comments.

He felt embarrassed, she added.

The Other Side

The main objection to the grandmother’s Epcot trip, as Disney Dining summarized it, was that she should have asked first.

Some suspected she skipped the question because her son and daughter-in-law would have said no.

Another commenter said she knew where the line was and stepped over it.

That roundup adds that the daughter-in-law had talked about saving up for a Disney trip with the kids.

If you had been saving for a first Disney trip with your kids, you would probably want to be there.

If you were the grandmother, would a quick text have been too much?

A few commenters warned that the rift could cost her time with the kids.

A Los Angeles family therapist told Fox News Digital by email that the daughter-in-law’s disappointment is understandable.

The therapist described the Epcot day as good for the kids and their grandmother.

In her view, the kids’ mother could focus on their joy instead of on who arranged the outing.

She suggested the two women’s relationship might already have been strained, which could have made the daughter-in-law’s distress worse.

Clearing a Day Trip With Parents

A day trip to Epcot or anywhere else comes with details to settle with the parents first, and car seats are one of them.

Under Florida law, children 5 or younger must ride in a crash-tested, federally approved child restraint.

A booster seat is allowed from age 4.

The Los Angeles therapist told Fox News Digital that parents who entrust a grandparent with young kids need to give up some control over the way things get done.

Zero to Three, a national nonprofit, has a guide to sharing child care between generations.

It says to be clear about which rules are firm and which can bend.

The page's example is a parent who holds firm on nap time but relaxes about an occasional treat.

Its questions cover the starting point on sleep, mealtimes, discipline and screens.

Others ask about the schedule, how you'll communicate and what counts as an emergency.

A day trip tests those last three: The hours run long, the check-ins matter more and an emergency would be harder to handle far from home.

Money is on the list too: About 22% of grandparents are paid for child care, per the page, and it says to have the talk anyway.

It says to revisit the agreement regularly, perhaps monthly at first.

Its tips for bringing up a problem start with how you feel.

The page's examples run from "I love when you..." to "I'm worried about..."