Disney Dream Party of Eight: 5-night Double Dip June 7-12 2011

[LissaW16]

Loving it all so far. We're planning to take our DD on our first cruise when she turns 4, so I'm dying to hear how yours did on the cruise!

In a nutshell - she did awesome. Our DD is a very "low key" kid - an only child, very quiet, prefers reading books, coloring, and dollhouses over rough-housing or outdoor play, AND she is a seasoned traveler. She normally goes to bed at 7pm, and is awake at 6:45am, so our biggest challenge was trying to figure out how to keep her up late (when she doesn't nap and doesn't sleep in). We had early dining, and she sat quietly through dinner for 4 of the 5 nights - and these are 2 hour long meals!

I think 4 is the perfect age for WDW - the characters are still very magical, but you're past the diapers/bottles/naps/carry the mom purse full of cheerios and teddy grahams stage. Cruising would be easy (easier than WDW) with any age - but potty trained/over 3 yrs old gives you much more flexibility and more options...

Other TR's I have read mentioned kids who didn't want to go to Kid's Club. Our DD is in daycare full time, so going to kid's club wasn't "foreign" to her (I would theorize that those kids that don't like it are not "daycare" kids). She also LOVES Toy Story, so the opportunity to play in Andy's Room was not one to be missed. Each time we took her, she was given the option - "Do you want to go to kid's club to play?" and each time we offered, she eagerly accepted.

Plus, we had 3 adults (me, DH, & Grandma Val) that rotated as her "primary" caregivers, so no one felt "burdened" with "kid duty". We took turns taking her to character meets, putting her to bed, taking her to the pool, etc., which gave each of us some "grown-up" time (for things like the DIS board meet, shopping in Nassau, gym time, spa time, late night hot tubbing, lunch at Serenity Bay, etc.).

My cruising tip with kids - take along your extended family. They serve as "relief parents", yet if you don't want to spend all your time with them, you don't even have to see them except for dinner - as I will explain when I finally write the cruise portion of the TR (sorry it's so slow - I spend too much time choosing, down-sizing, cropping, and uploading pictures to actually write text!).

-Melissa

 

[harleyquinn]

In a nutshell - she did awesome. Our DD is a very "low key" kid - an only child, very quiet, prefers reading books, coloring, and dollhouses over rough-housing or outdoor play, AND she is a seasoned traveler. She normally goes to bed at 7pm, and is awake at 6:45am, so our biggest challenge was trying to figure out how to keep her up late (when she doesn't nap and doesn't sleep in). We had early dining, and she sat quietly through dinner for 4 of the 5 nights - and these are 2 hour long meals!

I think 4 is the perfect age for WDW - the characters are still very magical, but you're past the diapers/bottles/naps/carry the mom purse full of cheerios and teddy grahams stage. Cruising would be easy (easier than WDW) with any age - but potty trained/over 3 yrs old gives you much more flexibility and more options...

Other TR's I have read mentioned kids who didn't want to go to Kid's Club. Our DD is in daycare full time, so going to kid's club wasn't "foreign" to her (I would theorize that those kids that don't like it are not "daycare" kids). She also LOVES Toy Story, so the opportunity to play in Andy's Room was not one to be missed. Each time we took her, she was given the option - "Do you want to go to kid's club to play?" and each time we offered, she eagerly accepted.

Plus, we had 3 adults (me, DH, & Grandma Val) that rotated as her "primary" caregivers, so no one felt "burdened" with "kid duty". We took turns taking her to character meets, putting her to bed, taking her to the pool, etc., which gave each of us some "grown-up" time (for things like the DIS board meet, shopping in Nassau, gym time, spa time, late night hot tubbing, lunch at Serenity Bay, etc.).

My cruising tip with kids - take along your extended family. They serve as "relief parents", yet if you don't want to spend all your time with them, you don't even have to see them except for dinner - as I will explain when I finally write the cruise portion of the TR (sorry it's so slow - I spend too much time choosing, down-sizing, cropping, and uploading pictures to actually write text!).

-Melissa

Oh thank you so much for all of those thoughts!! My plan is to convince my SIL and her SO to come with us, I think our DD loves them as much as she loves us! DD has already been to WDW twice and we'll be doing more travel before 2013. She'll also have been in preschool for a year, so I think that will help.

I can't wait to read the rest!!

 

[LissaW16]

Thank you for your patience; embarkation day (and food pics) finally posted.

It will be at least Monday night or later before the next installment is finished; we leave tomorrow after work for East Troy, WI... to spend the weekend partying in an RV with 4 other friends, and going to the Jimmy Buffet concert at Alpine Valley!


Central Wisconsin may not be everyone's definition of paradise, but anywhere right now is better than here in northern Minnesota:

 

[jenseib]

I am just joinging and and only started reading the intro ,but I had to comment already. Some of your travelers are my neighbors. I live in Swanton, OH, which is about 20 minutes west of Toledo...so basically Toledo is my town as well. When someone asks me wher I'm from...thats basically wher I tell them. Anyways..hi to my neighbors! ..and I'll go back to reading

 

[harleyquinn]

Hope you had a great time at the concert...now get back to work on this report missy!

 

[LissaW16]

I am just joinging and and only started reading the intro ,but I had to comment already. Some of your travelers are my neighbors. I live in Swanton, OH, which is about 20 minutes west of Toledo...so basically Toledo is my town as well. When someone asks me wher I'm from...thats basically wher I tell them. Anyways..hi to my neighbors! ..and I'll go back to reading

Thanks for reading! I enjoyed your April Dream trip report and food trip report... I also read some of your Cedar Point TR too... I went to high school in Perrysburg, so my "hometown" is also "Toledo". Small world!

 

[LissaW16]

Hope you had a great time at the concert...now get back to work on this report missy!

I will get back to it soon, I promise. It took 2 days to recover from the weekend, then "life" got in the way (lawn mowing, garden tending, etc etc etc) - not to mention that I also work full time .

Today's project - copy my 4.11 GB of pics to DVD's to share with my travel partners. It is taking way longer than expected~ note to self: CD-RW does not equal DVD-RW. (who's a dork? I hate to admit that I work in the IS department, computers are WHAT I DO FOR A LIVING!) After realizing that it took 6 disks to store one copy of all the photos, a trip to Office Max later and now I'm writing to DVD's, which are taking like an hour each!

Thanks for hanging in there. I promise to finish this TR before we leave on our next cruise - another 5-night double-dip on the Dream, April 2012!

 

[jenseib]

Yay, an update! I love that you met some different characters. I wish we had a few extra days, so I could use one just for character hunting.

Thanks for reading! I enjoyed your April Dream trip report and food trip report... I also read some of your Cedar Point TR too... I went to high school in Perrysburg, so my "hometown" is also "Toledo". Small world!

Small world it is!

 

[LissaW16]

Our Pirate Night dinner was in Enchanted Garden. I had one of the specialty cocktails (the Rusty Anchor), potstickers, chilled watermelon & honeydew soup, prime rib with sweet potato sticks, and a banana and chocolate crepe for dessert.


Grandma Val had the crab cake appetizer and some kind of salad, I forget what else. Tim had some kind of potato soup, the seafood pasta, and a Mickey bar for dessert.
Crab cake:


Salad:


Tim’s supper:


Trinity’s supper (a green salad and a beef entrée):


Chocolate dessert (skidmark!):


Chocolate cake dessert:


Pineapple appetizer that was also a dessert:

 

[LissaW16]

Navigator page links:
Day 1 p 1
Day 1 p 2
Day 1 p 3
Day 1 p 4

Day 2 p 1
Day 2 p 2
Day 2 p 3
Day 2 p 4

Day 3 p 1
Day 3 p 2
Day 3 p 3
Day 3 p 4

Day 4 p 1
Day 4 p 2
Day 4 p 3
Day 4 p 4
Pirate Night Details

Day 5 p 1
Day 5 p 2
Day 5 p 3
Day 5 p 4
Castaway Cay Navigator p 1
Castaway Cay Navigator p 2

Debarkation Day p 1
Debarkation Day p 2

Kid's Menus from the Dream:
Animator's Palate Kids Menu
Royal Palace Kids Menu
Enchanted Garden Kids Menu
Pirate Night Kids Menu

Dream Breakfast Room Service Menu:
Breakfast Room Service Menu

 

[AnkaG]

Hi,

I was wondering if the room service breakfast is free?

thanks

Anka

 

[LissaW16]

Hi,

I was wondering if the room service breakfast is free?

thanks

Anka

Yes, room service is complimentary, any time of the day. The menu for "not breakfast" was part of a hard-bound book so I couldn't bring it home. It was sandwiches and snacks and stuff.

Tipping is of course encouraged, for the staff bringing the food.

It is my understanding (although we never ordered) that sodas and buckets of beer are available via room service, and there is a charge for those.

 

[LissaW16]

I had the chilled seafood trio AND the seared salmon (yes, two apps!), spinach salad with blue cheese, and stuffed orange roughy. For dessert I had the baked Alaska.



Trinity had the kid’s spaghetti and meatballs, and a banana split:



Tim had the conch chowder, a steak entrée, the lamb entrée, and the baked Alaska dessert.

Tim’s conch chowder:


Tim’s Meat entrées:


Grandma Val’s entrée:


Grandma Val’s Shrimp cocktail:

 

[LissaW16]

My Fish Extender gifts:




I wish I would have taken a pic of the giant pile of stuff that we received from other DIS'ers... just know that it was fun making the stuff, delivering the stuff, and getting the stuff, so I HIGHLY recommend participating in a FE exchange if given the opportunity.

 

[jenseib]

Thanks for sharing your trip with us

 

[kellyb2000]

Oh I miss it so much!!!! Even with our "disappointments" it was such a fantastic vacation!

We loved being on deck 8 - you know we were just a few doors down from you. We had to be moved (issued with door/lock). It was a fabulous upgrade and actually enhanced our trip SO much! We had a GTY room up until about a month before we cruised and the wait before we were assigned a room just about killed us. Sorry! I'm sure you'll make it until next year, though!

I LOVE the aquaduck photo you posted! So wishing I had packed a waterproof camera so I could have gotten a shot or two like that!

 

[LissaW16]

I LOVE the aquaduck photo you posted! So wishing I had packed a waterproof camera so I could have gotten a shot or two like that!

Totally worth the $10 I paid for it, but the $14 to have the pics developed and a photo CD made, now that wasn't quite worth it... (the CD was only $2.99...)

 

[LissaW16]

The aforementioned Don "Ducky" Williams sketches:

Grandma Val's Pinnocchio:



Tim's Pooh bear:

 

[ugogirl]

I know I have seen directions elsewhere, but can you give me some basic idea of how to make all those amazing door decorations? My kids saw those and just flipped. Now they want me to do that too! If you can tell me where you found the images, and how you made them into magnets, that would help a lot. And did you just insert text boxes to customize them?

 

[tony64]

Thanks for posting your trip report, I've really enjoyed reading it and looking at the great food pictures.