When did your kid learn the truth about the characters?

The 8 year old tells me that they are people in costumes. I have informed her she is not tricking me into walking up to the beast and doing anything that could get my arm chewed off. When the teen was 4 we did the magic shot with Tinker Belle. For about 2 years she would just look at the picture then her hand and look back to the picture. Magic is great at that age.
 
We took my daughter's best friend and her family when the girls were 5 and 6. The 6 year old best friend was terrified of the characters, so her mother told her that all the characters (fur and face) were actors, and she promptly told my daughter. My daughter cried off an on for days. We finally calmed her down by telling her that it was a job she might be able to get some day...
 
We first went when my son was five. He hadn’t watched many shows with Disney characters before our trip. We decided to introduce him to a few before we went and watched a few movies, so he knew Pooh and friends, Peter Pan , Mary poppins, Tom Sawyer ( bad call, I know), Mickey and friends, etc.
I think he knew the costumed characters were just that, from Halloween. But one day we went into the England store and there was Pooh, we were thrilled and took some pics.
When walked out back into the courtyard,Mary poppins was right there, alone! He held back, telling me that wasn’t her, that her face was different, but I said hello..
That wonderful woman noticed his hesitation and crouched down to talk to him. She said she thought he noticed she might look a little different ( and she was too far away to have heard him). She asked if he had seen her movie, then explained that an actress had played her in the movie, because she had to take care of the children...but didn’t he think Julie Andrews looked a bit like her?
For quite awhile afterwards he told everyone that he had met the REAL Mary poppins! He was sold.
By our next trip, at eight, he just wanted character meal pics and seeing them spontaneously was a treat, but of course he had figured things out by then.
 
My DD age 3, asks me after every meet with a fur character they can’t talk right?

I’m not sure what she is getting at, but she is loving meeting them this trip. It’s been so much fun seeing her meet the characters, I doubt she will ever enjoy character meets this much again. But we have had some great interactions this trip!
 
One of my kids was 7 before she mentioned it. One was 3. Before our trip I was sat down by my son who said "Mommy I need to talk to you, Mickey isn't real but a person in a character body. I thought you should know before we go to Disney" This was after I told him how excited I was to go to Disney and see Mickey again :( Sometimes they grow up too fast.
 
my kids just knew that characters are men in costumes. but we never talked about it. we are that family who tell kids that there is no santa nor tooth fairy..
 


Kiddo figured it out pretty much at 3. Even before we went to Disney, we attended some science fiction conventions and she shrugged and said "They're just people in costumes."
Last year at age 5, she could still be taken in by VERY good cast members.... she believed that Spider Man at Disneyland was real for instance. But I'm pretty sure that she'll shrug off most of the live characters during our upcoming WDW trip. On one hand, it's sad... but on the other, I can't be too upset about having a smart cookie who isn't easily fooled.
 
My 4 yos leaned really close to the Easter Bunny this year and said, "Are you really just a person dressed up like a bunny?" but then proceeded to ask to visit whenever we were at the mall this season. So, just because they know doesn't mean they don't love the visit. :-)
 
Our almost 6 year old seems to very much still believe or just really wants to believe, at school the high school mascot came and he saw it take off the head and he came home kinda shocked and upset but on our next trip still thought the characters were “real” then after a Disney trip a kid in his kindergarten class told him that captain jack sparrow is fake and my son was like no I met the REAL one at Disney! We do a lot to keep the magic alive for our kids with Disney and Santa etc it makes me sad to think when they’ll lose that
 
I don't think they ever thought they were real. Our youngest was terrified of all of them the first time he meet them, so we were more concerned about calming him down. It didn't spoil any fun. At 11 my son thinks Micky Mouse should be visited every chance he gets. The youngest at 8 last year finally was brave enough to meet characters last year.
 
my 4 year old daughter has recently started asking questions about the characters and whether they are real, or people in costume. How old were your kids when they learned “the truth” about the characters, and how did you handle it?

My kids always knew that the characters were people in a costume.
 
When each of our 3 kids asked we told them they were just people inside the costumes. It has not diminished their excitement to meet each character at all.
 
Wait...what?! The characters are just people dressed up in costumes? o_O


Seriously tho, I don't lie, so when my kids have asked, I tell them. Otherwise, we believe for as long as they do. pixiedust:
 
My DD knew the fur characters were fake when we went at 4. She’s almost 6 now and still thinks all face characters are real.
My 6 year old daughter is just the opposite! She knows the face characters are just dressed up but still holds onto the belief that full-costume characters are real (despite some strong hints to the contrary by her 8 year old sister). It helps that our family-favorite meet-n-greet character is Baymax, who looks and feels so darn real!
:smickey:
 
If you feel the magic in your heart- they're real. My MIL is almost 80 and you should see her face in the pictures with Cinderella!
 
My daughter is 7 and still believes many of the fur characters are real. It's not across the board though. At this age if she asks me about a particular character or mascot at a sporting event I will tell her, but only if she asks. I think she wants to believe, so it doesn't surprise me that her favorites she still believes are real.

Her favorite is Minnie and my friend sent her some rose gold minnie ears from the park (from Minnie) and she 1000% believes Minnie really sent her ears. She will tell anyone who will listen, friends, family, CM at the Disney Store, cashiers at the market. :)

I'm holding on to the magic as long as I can.
 
When my now 16-year old niece was 3.5 the attendant outside the Winnie the Pooh ride told her the ride was down because Tinkerbelle had spilled honey all over the ride. She believed that for years. Recently, she told me that once at a Chip and Dale meet and greet she could see into Dale's mouth and saw a man's face. She said it really creeped her out. I am guessing she was about 6 when that happened. She said after that she believed for a long time that face characters were real, but costumed characters were not.
 
I agree with not lying but at the same time I got to prolong the magic a little longer. When my son started asking questions because he saw Mickey in Epcot and then Mickey in MK he wanted to know how that could be. I turned around and asked him...”Hmmm...what do you think is going on?” And he came up with “I think so many people want to meet Mickey that they have some people dressed up like Mickey and only one is the real Mickey.” Definitely! I agreed. And added “And you never know which one you are meeting.” He was around 4-5 when we had this conversation, and I’m glad I didn’t out and tell him because it bought me a few more trips of magic fun.
Kids always come up with the best stuff on their own.

My DD asked me that question when she was 4. I said that they must really have good schedule for him to get him from place to place. My DD said, "No, I don't think that's it. I think he has a magic car." I told her she was probably right!

Even though she is now 14 and knows what's up, she still talks about them like they are real (that goes for Santa and the Easter Bunny too). If her older brother says anything, she tells him to stop ruining the magic.
 
Mine NEVER even considered that they were real as far as I can remember. However, they always loved them anyway. Over the years we have done almost every character meal on property and most of them many times. We have awesome pictures of the most amazing smiles on our boys faces. Now at 25 and 11 they still love all things Disney including characters.
 

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