Just how rough were the seas that night? Well, drawing on my (at the time)
24 minutes of sailing experience, I'd say they were about this rough:
That picture was taken out of our port hole just before we headed up to dinner. You're probably not clamoring for a closer look at our traveling partner, but I'm going to put up anyway. After all, it's not everyday that you run into a ship of this quality. Unless you work at a shipyard, dismantling vessels that are no longer deemed sea-worthy.
A quick check of the information printed on our room key said that our rotational dining tonight would take us to Animator's Pallet.
Who knew Disney was so literal with their restaurant names?
Bawhahahahaha! OK, on with the TR....
Animator's Palate is on Deck 3 Aft on the Dream, down a long hallway lined on one side with sketches and paintings of Disney characters and on the other with a seemingly endless array of portholes. Glancing out each one, the weather did not appear to be getting any better. We were still finding our sea legs after having spent the first couple of hours on the ship securely tied to the dock. There was some pitching, some rolling, and a bunch of back and forth movement. And that was just us trying to walk down the hallway!
We were met at the entrance of the restaurant by several cheery greeters handing out sanitizing wipes. They even had special collection bins strategically placed in the walls - obvious enough to see them, but discrete enough that they don't subtract from the theming.
Just beyond the hand wipe folks was two rows of servers, each lining one side of the entrance. The first ones in each row would take turns greeting a family and showing them to their table. The next server in line would step up and repeat the process with the next guest. Not only do you get welcomed to dinner by 30 or 40 people, but it turns out to be a very efficient way to get a lot of people seated very quickly.
One nice surprise when we got to the table? The kids both had personalized water cups sitting there waiting for them. Complete with a little Mickey head!
The decor of the restaurant is exactly as you would expect - an animator's workshop. Giant pencils and paint brushes served as pillars, cork boards filled with sketches and shelf after shelf of maquettes, books, and art supplies lined the walls.
Honestly, I could have wandered around that restaurant for hours just looking at all of the stuff they had in there! But I couldn't. Because I was hungry.
The whole restaurant is laid out almost in little pods of tables. Each one had several TV screens where we were greeted by the likes of Crush and his pals from Finding Nemo. Just like the Turtle Talk with Crush attraction at Epcot, Crush would interact with diners. And each pod was just isolated enough from the others so you'd only pay attention to your screen and not notice what was going on on other screens.
Crush wasn't always visiting with you, and when he was off at another area, random characters from Finding Nemo would swim by. Or in some cases, play volleyball with a puffer fish. Other times schools of silver fish would starting forming a picture, giving everyone a chance to guess it.
We were introduced to our server, Denis from Croatia, and our assistant server, Carmen from Spain. I forgot to take their picture, but I have one from the next night coming up soon. That's made possible by Disney's rotational dining. Each night you are assigned a different dining room, but your server, assistant server and head server (Ivo, also from Croatia) all go with you. Disney touts this a another touch of personalized service, but I didn't really buy into it at first. After all, they serve hundreds of people a night in two seatings, how much are they really going to "get to know you and your likes/dislikes" in that short amount of time? Answer: plenty. Or at least enough to fake like they do, which is all I really wanted.
So, we had the animations on the screen to distract us from the rocking of the ship, which had seemed to get worse, little by little, though out dinner. Speaking of dinner, you are presented with a menu sans prices. Why? It's all included in the cost of the cruise. Some things do cost extra - like wine or specialty drinks - but everything else is included. Can't decided between the chicken strips and the mac and cheese? Get both!
That's Evan's plate. And after what he had for lunch, I'm sure none of you are surprised, are you?
Madison ordered the steak, which Denis brought out and promptly began to cut up for her. As a parent, how did I feel about a person I'd known for all of 35 minutes cutting up my daughter's steak? Less work for me - he got an extra tip at the end of the cruise!
It was vacation, where most nutritional rules are bent or outright broken, but since each child's meal came with peas, we decreed that the kids must at least eat some of them.
This one's going to be a troublemaker, I can tell you that.
I don't recall what I had, but checking out the menu online, I would guess I had the Marinated Angus Beef Tenderloin. I would normally gone for the Grilled Pacific Black Cod, but think I would remember eating the "Yellow Split Pea Purée" that came with it.
Evan's dessert was a chocolate cake/brownie thing. I only took the picture because of the Mickey head on the plate.
I do know that, upon the recommendation of both our server Denis and several people here on the DIS, I ordered the Cookie Sundae for dessert. It sure doesn't sound very fancy - just vanilla ice cream and a cookie - but it was fresh, high quality ice cream and a fresh baked cookie. MMmmmmmm...
During dinner, there was enough rocking of the ship that you could watch the water shift around in your glass. It made eating at bit difficult because your stomach was just a bit queasy, but you're putting so much delicious food into it anyway. Soooo much delicious food.
However, there was no vomiting - at least from our traveling party. Bambi's doctor told her that Dramamine was completely safe for the baby. In fact, it has the same medicine in it that doctors prescribe for morning sickness. She would take one each day, as did Madison. I think I took one or two over the course of the cruise but don't honestly remember. Evan - ye of the iron stomach - never took anything and never had an issue.
After we finished up dinner, we had a few minutes to stop back down at the stateroom and freshen up a bit before that night's show. When we got there, we found that the room was all made up for us for the night...
...and that we had some new stuff on the bed.
Since we're DVC members, we had a DVC flyer and a nice DVC keepsake/jewelry box to go along with some chocolates, the next day's Navigator and a towel....um....animal? I'm taking suggestions as to what you think it is.
You can see in this picture looking back at the door that there are two bathrooms - one with a toilet and sink, the other with a shower and sink. What an awesome idea!
The ceiling of the upper bunk was a stary night. Another cool touch!
And a close up of the pillow on the bed that tried it's hardest to fall into my suitcase every time it was open. Time after time it fell in, but I had to keep telling it "no, little pillow, you have to stay here and delight other guests on the next cruise."
Up Next: A lot of horrible photographs of the Golden Mickeys!
Mind. Blown.
I wish I could've taken him home with me. 
A girl, huh?
