9/20/09 Wonder

[OurOhana]

Hello all... as the counter ticks down I get more and more excited about this vacation...
My husband and I are going to be making our FE and I also purchased some magnetic printer sheets to make a few decorations for our door!!!

Now I need help on figuring out what to buy for the gifts... what kind of gifts do you guys purchase for the FE? Since this is our first time we have no clue!!!

Can't wait to have everything ready!!!!!

Hi there - We're so excited too. So much right before we go with work and our daughter starting a new school, but the fun and relaxation of the cruise is just a short time away.

We're still looking at f/e gift ideas - we've been to the dollar store, disney store, disney outlet and looked online. Lot of looking, not a lot of buying yet. To get ideas, I read a lot of threads where people gave ideas of gifts from previous cruises. Maybe visiting those will help you too.

Hopefully everyone else can correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding is in general the f/e gifts can be homemade or store bought, or a mix of both. They don't have to cost a lot of money. I've read about people who gave candy, water bottles, magnets, little trinkets, disney or pirate-related items, including tatoos, stickers, pens, pencils, etc. I don't know if that helps, and again, hopefully others will pop on and help out a bit more with ideas.

 

[LC30]

Hey everyone. Haven't been on in a few days. Just started a new job a few weeks ago and its kept me pretty busy along with other activities. Hopefully, I'll be able to get back to planning for this trip again.

On the last cruise, we got and gave a range of FE gifts - candy, homemade door hangers, magnets, lots of $1 toys, pirate accessories - eye patch etc, CD. It was great. Target dollar aisles, Dollar store, Michaels and the like have some great finds. Or you can do more. Happy hunting.

 

[asj04mom]

Hello everyone, I booked this cruise in January and now that it is down to the a little over a month, my excitement has increased... this will be my dd's first cruise ever, she is only 4 and my second cruise.. so we are both excited... so look forward to getting engaged in this forum, and learning all I need to know about DCL...

 

[LC30]

Hello everyone, I booked this cruise in January and now that it is down to the a little over a month, my excitement has increased... this will be my dd's first cruise ever, she is only 4 and my second cruise.. so we are both excited... so look forward to getting engaged in this forum, and learning all I need to know about DCL...

Welcome aboard! We're looking forward to getting to know you better.

 

[Pinky166]

Hi everyone. Hope you guys are all keeping well.

I haven't been around too much this week as my dad has been in hospital since Sunday so I have been running around all over the place (my mum doesn't drive) & visiting him everyday, he had two stomach ulcers. Hopefully he may be home Thursday or Friday.

How is everyone's planning coming along?

asj04mom - Welcome aboard! Looking forward to getting to know you.

 

[LC30]

I haven't been around too much this week as my dad has been in hospital since Sunday so I have been running around all over the place (my mum doesn't drive) & visiting him everyday, he had two stomach ulcers. Hopefully he may be home Thursday or Friday.

How is everyone's planning coming along?

I'm sorry to hear your dad isn't well. Sending you good thoughts to get him home quickly. I haven't even started the planning yet. Been really busy at work and also with preparations for DS starting a new school at the end of the month. Soon, I'll be knee deep in planning. Can't wait.

BTW, what are everyone's plans on excursion? Just curious.

 

[dis ms.]

Hi everyone. Hope you guys are all keeping well.

I haven't been around too much this week as my dad has been in hospital since Sunday so I have been running around all over the place (my mum doesn't drive) & visiting him everyday, he had two stomach ulcers. Hopefully he may be home Thursday or Friday.

How is everyone's planning coming along?

asj04mom - Welcome aboard! Looking forward to getting to know you.

Sorry to hear about your dad. Hope he makes a quick recovery!

 

[Mbrwr]

Hello everyone... we just came back from a very wet camping trip. Like I have told you guys before I just graduated nursing school in may and today I accepted a position to work night shift at the well baby Nursery. I'm very excited.. I always knew I wanted to work with newborns so getting this job is a dream come true. ... Tomorrow I'm going over to the hospital to tell my future manager that even though I start my orientation on Aug. 25th I have a 10 day vacation planned on starting Sep. 14th. I really hope all goes well... So please keep your fingers crossed for me!!! I'll update you guys tomorrow!!!!

Have a good night everyone!!!!

 

[cara620]

Ahoy there..I hope I am not joining the party too late. We are booked on the Wonder 9/20-24/09 in stateroom 8010. This is our first "family" cruise..DH and I have taken a couple with RCCL (but please don't hold that against us)...but this is the first for our kids and on DCL. We are also DVC members and got this cruise with a points add-on..so we are headed to our home resort (Animal Kingdom Villas)for 3 night following the cruise.

Let's seeeee..other fun info..we live in VA..and we are driving down the night before on the 19th. We are a fam of 5..me (Cara) DH (Ray)..Will 10, Brooke 8, and Hope 2. DH and I are celebrateing our 15th anniversary on 9/24.

We are all very excited...but I think I am the most excited .

We would love to be included in the FE fun.

Ummm okay...where can I get an FE? I just looked on ebay and the only ones I can find are $30...a little more than I was looking to spend. Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Cara

Oh and this is my first post on Disboards!!!! Total newbie!

 

[Mbrwr]

Ahoy there..I hope I am not joining the party too late. We are booked on the Wonder 9/20-24/09 in stateroom 8010. This is our first "family" cruise..DH and I have taken a couple with RCCL (but please don't hold that against us)...but this is the first for our kids and on DCL. We are also DVC members and got this cruise with a points add-on..so we are headed to our home resort (Animal Kingdom Villas)for 3 night following the cruise.

Let's seeeee..other fun info..we live in VA..and we are driving down the night before on the 19th. We are a fam of 5..me (Cara) DH (Ray)..Will 10, Brooke 8, and Hope 2. DH and I are celebrateing our 15th anniversary on 9/24.

We are all very excited...but I think I am the most excited .

We would love to be included in the FE fun.

Ummm okay...where can I get an FE? I just looked on ebay and the only ones I can find are $30...a little more than I was looking to spend. Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Cara

Oh and this is my first post on Disboards!!!! Total newbie!

Welcome Cara!!! Glad to know that you are sailing with us!! I'm also a newbie here and this will also be our first family cruise. My kids are Gabriella 8 and Nathan 5. DH and I went on our first cruise in March to celebrate our 9th anniversary.
As far as the FE we're going to "try" to make ours... Let's see how that goes.


As for my job dilemma... It's all GOOD!!!! My new manager didn't care at all and I get to go on our vacation AND have my dream job!!!!

 

[LC30]

Hello everyone... we just came back from a very wet camping trip. Like I have told you guys before I just graduated nursing school in may and today I accepted a position to work night shift at the well baby Nursery. I'm very excited.. I always knew I wanted to work with newborns so getting this job is a dream come true. ... Tomorrow I'm going over to the hospital to tell my future manager that even though I start my orientation on Aug. 25th I have a 10 day vacation planned on starting Sep. 14th. I really hope all goes well... So please keep your fingers crossed for me!!! I'll update you guys tomorrow!!!!

Have a good night everyone!!!!

Congratulations! MMMmmmm...I love the smell of babies and I just love holding them. So cute. Its sounds like a dream job. They are so cute. How did it go? Did you tell you new manager?

 

[LC30]

Ahoy there..I hope I am not joining the party too late.

We would love to be included in the FE fun.

Ummm okay...where can I get an FE? I just looked on ebay and the only ones I can find are $30...a little more than I was looking to spend. Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Cara

Oh and this is my first post on Disboards!!!! Total newbie!

Welcome! We're glad you could join us! It should be lots of fun. I'll add you guys to the FE list on the FE thread this weekend. Work has been crazy busy, so I've been putting in long hours.

As for FEs, I'm not so crafty, so I ended up buying one on ebay. There is a wonderful lady who sells them. I bought mine for $20 or $25...can't remember but she customized it for us. I think on ebay they show ones with 4 pockets for $30. I got one with 2 pockets and it was a little cheaper. They turned out great. Happy hunting.

Hope to get to know you better on the site.

 

[splashmommy]

Hello everyone -

This will be my family's second Disney cruise. It will be me, my husband, our son who is 6. We are all very excited and can not wait to set sail! We will be staying at AKL the night before the cruise.

Tara

 

[OurOhana]

Wow. I feel like I've been away from our meet thread forever - and I've missed so much. I'm thrilled to see that so many more families are here. And I'm getting very antsy about the cruise. It's pretty much all I want to think about, though work has kept me very busy. Plus, my daughter starts a new school for preK next week and her 4th birthday is next Saturday. Busy. Busy.

Hello everyone -

This will be my family's second Disney cruise. It will be me, my husband, our son who is 6. We are all very excited and can not wait to set sail! We will be staying at AKL the night before the cruise.

Tara

Welcome Tara and family. This is also our second Dis cruise. We loved the first. And AKL sounds like a blast. AK is the only one of the parks we haven't been too yet. I'd love to go one day soon.

Ahoy there..I hope I am not joining the party too late. We are booked on the Wonder 9/20-24/09 in stateroom 8010. This is our first "family" cruise..DH and I have taken a couple with RCCL (but please don't hold that against us)...but this is the first for our kids and on DCL. We are also DVC members and got this cruise with a points add-on..so we are headed to our home resort (Animal Kingdom Villas)for 3 night following the cruise.

Let's seeeee..other fun info..we live in VA..and we are driving down the night before on the 19th. We are a fam of 5..me (Cara) DH (Ray)..Will 10, Brooke 8, and Hope 2. DH and I are celebrateing our 15th anniversary on 9/24.

We are all very excited...but I think I am the most excited .

We would love to be included in the FE fun.

Ummm okay...where can I get an FE? I just looked on ebay and the only ones I can find are $30...a little more than I was looking to spend. Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Cara

Oh and this is my first post on Disboards!!!! Total newbie!

Cara - Welcome to the meet and the disboards. I think you'll love exploring the board. As the cruise gets closer, I'm getting more and more addicted to the board. They're so helpful. And I'm again very jealous about the AK trip. What fun!

I'll be interested to hear your thoughts about RCCL compared to DCL. We'd love to try an RCCL. We've done Holland as a couple, and really liked it. But we think RCCL would be our second choice now that we have a child.

We've decided to send material off to my hubby's aunt in Hawaii to make us a fishextender (I'm just completely out of my element with needle, thread or even an iron - sad, but true. My mother is especailly not happy about the no ironing.)

Hello everyone... we just came back from a very wet camping trip. Like I have told you guys before I just graduated nursing school in may and today I accepted a position to work night shift at the well baby Nursery. I'm very excited.. I always knew I wanted to work with newborns so getting this job is a dream come true. ... Tomorrow I'm going over to the hospital to tell my future manager that even though I start my orientation on Aug. 25th I have a 10 day vacation planned on starting Sep. 14th. I really hope all goes well... So please keep your fingers crossed for me!!! I'll update you guys tomorrow!!!!

Have a good night everyone!!!!

Wow, what a great, rewarding job. I'm a newspaper writer, and one the best stories I've ever read (not from my anyone I knew or worked with) was one about nurses who worked in a IC unit for infants, at least that's my memory. If I can find it, I'll send it to you. It was incredibly moving.

Hi everyone. Hope you guys are all keeping well.

I haven't been around too much this week as my dad has been in hospital since Sunday so I have been running around all over the place (my mum doesn't drive) & visiting him everyday, he had two stomach ulcers. Hopefully he may be home Thursday or Friday.

How is everyone's planning coming along?

asj04mom - Welcome aboard! Looking forward to getting to know you.

Pinky - I'm so sorry to hear about your dad. How's he doing? I know that can be so stressful, but it's good that you sound like you live nearby, so you can help your mom out.

Hello everyone, I booked this cruise in January and now that it is down to the a little over a month, my excitement has increased... this will be my dd's first cruise ever, she is only 4 and my second cruise.. so we are both excited... so look forward to getting engaged in this forum, and learning all I need to know about DCL...

Welcome! My daughter was 3 on our last cruise and she LOVED it. She still talks about the Mickey Boat. She has no idea we're doing another cruise, or that grandma is coming with us. This is a great forum for getting info. Don't be shy about asking questions.

Hey everyone. Haven't been on in a few days. Just started a new job a few weeks ago and its kept me pretty busy along with other activities. Hopefully, I'll be able to get back to planning for this trip again.

On the last cruise, we got and gave a range of FE gifts - candy, homemade door hangers, magnets, lots of $1 toys, pirate accessories - eye patch etc, CD. It was great. Target dollar aisles, Dollar store, Michaels and the like have some great finds. Or you can do more. Happy hunting.

Hi there. How's the job going? (and I agree, we've found FE gifts at all the places you mentioned.)

OK - I'm going to stop for now before the typos get worse. (hope my post makes some sense. I've been writing all day. Hope everyone has a great weekend!!!

 

[LC30]

Hello everyone -

This will be my family's second Disney cruise. It will be me, my husband, our son who is 6. We are all very excited and can not wait to set sail! We will be staying at AKL the night before the cruise.

Tara

Welcome aboard! Glad to have you join us! This should be a fun group.

All, I might need a little advance specially from those of you with young kids. We are in a dilemma and are not sure if we should cancel our trip. We had booked this trip back in June before we made any major decisions about m DS' school. He's currently in a school that is wonderful for young children. But he's getting to the age now (he just turned 3) where he needs more than just advanced daycare and babysitting. So, about 3 weeks ago, we enrolled him a new school that is French and Spanish immersion, which means no English is spoken at all. This is all great except the school starts at the end of August and we leave on vacation 3 weeks after he starts this school. We're worried about pulling him out for a week so close to the start of school. He's been talking about the cruise a lot. We got trip insurance which will cover 75% of the trip cost.

We REALLY want to do this trip but are really concerned about his adjustment for the first few weeks and then pulling him out for a week and then, readjustment back in. Anyone have any experience with this? Any advice is appreciated.

 

[LC30]

Hi there. How's the job going? (and I agree, we've found FE gifts at all the places you mentioned.)

Hey there. Thanks for asking. Job is going well! I'm learning a lot and have been putting in lots of hours because of a very big project that is going on. I jumped in right in the middle of the project but I'm enjoying it. The nice thing is there's more flexibility for me which is great with DS. I have more time to spend with him in the morning and I get home at a decent hour on most days. I make up the time late night and early morning which is fine because I can deal with Europe and Asia those times.

 

[OurOhana]

Welcome aboard! Glad to have you join us! This should be a fun group.

All, I might need a little advance specially from those of you with young kids. We are in a dilemma and are not sure if we should cancel our trip. We had booked this trip back in June before we made any major decisions about m DS' school. He's currently in a school that is wonderful for young children. But he's getting to the age now (he just turned 3) where he needs more than just advanced daycare and babysitting. So, about 3 weeks ago, we enrolled him a new school that is French and Spanish immersion, which means no English is spoken at all. This is all great except the school starts at the end of August and we leave on vacation 3 weeks after he starts this school. We're worried about pulling him out for a week so close to the start of school. He's been talking about the cruise a lot. We got trip insurance which will cover 75% of the trip cost.

We REALLY want to do this trip but are really concerned about his adjustment for the first few weeks and then pulling him out for a week and then, readjustment back in. Anyone have any experience with this? Any advice is appreciated.

It's funny you mention this. I've given a lot of thought to this lately too. Our daughter is starting a new private school next week. We live in Florida, where they have voluntary pre-K. The state picks up the tab, but it's not mandatory for kids to go. That being said, obviously an extra year of formal schooling has proven great for kids here so far (based on testing.) All of that being said, we're still going on the cruise. I figure we'll rarely want to pull her out of school as she's getting older (at least not for a week or more) but right now, she's still so young - no better time. (The rates were cheaper for us in September than earlier, especially since we're taking advantage of the bounceback offer.)

Obviously, everyone has their own opinion on this - and you should follow your instinct. You won't make a wrong decision, regardless of what you choose to do. I have a feeling if you end up going on the cruise, you'll find your son will adjust fine to his new school when he returns. (By the way - what a great school, you've described. It sounds like it'll be a great opportunity for him.) If you stay home, you won't regret that choice either. You could always get on another cruise when he's off school.

I too would be interest in hearing what others have done in similar situations.

 

[splashmommy]

Has anyone received their cabin assignment who is a GTY or a phone call regarding an upgrade?

 

[fahernand]

Has anyone received their cabin assignment who is a GTY or a phone call regarding an upgrade?

Nope, not yet. We have 7 Category 12, #GTY staterooms booked! Checking everyday

 

[LC30]

We are all very excited...but I think I am the most excited .

Oh and this is my first post on Disboards!!!! Total newbie!

Cara, Hey there. I just added you to the FE list. Its on page 8 thread 109. Have a great week.