Thank you to everyone for the wonderful FE gifts. It was one of the highlights for my DD. She loved finding gifts in the FE everytime we came back to the cabin.
I am sorry so many of you had bad experiences with CMs. We lucked out. Our Room steward, Made, was wonderful. He was always around in the hall and seemed to know when we stepped out for breakfast. He had our room made up everytime before we returned. We gave him a nice tip and a box of Mickey cookies that I had specially made. Our servers were very good. The assistant server was new but worked very hard and had a wonderful personality. He spent time joking with our DD and was her favorite. Our main server worked very hard and usually did not have time to talk until after the service. He was a Disney veteran that came over from the Magic. I even liked our Head Server, he came over every night to chat with us. We ate in AP the first night. The service was really slow but we think that the restuarant configuration was to blame and maybe our perception since it was the first night and we were excited to be done with dinner and to explore the ship. I found the food hit or miss. Some dishes I loved, others were just ok. Overall we really liked the meals - the servers, the food and the atmosphere. Cabanas and Corkys BBQ were ok. The chicken strips on deck 11 were awesome. I had a very good ham and cheese panini there too. Overall, I found a hard time finding a good piece of fruit. It was usually underripe or lacked flavor.
We did the Discover Atlantis tour. I wanted to set it since the last time I had been to Nassau, many years ago it was not there. I loved the guided tour of all the aquarium exhibits. My DD loved it so much that we went to the casino to get the DH and show him around. She remembered lots of the names of the fish and sea life and was proud to show her dad.
We live 2 blocks from the beach so it is hard to interest my DD in doing anything on the beach. We stayed on the ship the morning of the first CC stop and had the pools nearly to ourselves. Too bad the Duck broke down. We did go on CC for lunch and in the afternoon. Everyone was returning to the ship so we found a few abandoned rafts and floated around in the lagoon until 4:30. There was hardly anyone around where we were on the far end of the lagoon. By accident we were able to beat the crowds and had a really great day.
My daughter just loved the Oceaneers Club. Everytime we went to pick her up they were doing an organized activity and I would have to wait for a good stopping point. She said that lots of the characters visited the clubs including Mickey and Minnie. One evening we picked her up and Pulto was there. They were having Pluto's Pajama Party and she had decorated her own Pluto pillowcase. She usually went from 5:30-7:30pm then after dinner (we had the second rotation). The counselors picked her up in the restaurant lobby and we got to enjoy dessert service and an after dinner activity like a movie or a stroll around the deck by ourselves.
I thought the weather was absolutely gorgeous. We had a verandah on port side and enjoyed our view of CC and would often sit on the verandah and watch the waves. It was so relaxing. I loved our room and the split bath and toilet. I printed the list of packing items on this forum and many of the little extras came in handy. We booked with
AAA and got a fruit basket as a welcome gift and a plate of desserts on the last night in addition to a room credit. We didn't know we were getting any of that so it was a nice surprise.
I wished there was something else on TV besides Disney, ESPN, CNN and very limited ABC. Once I was watching Oprah and the screen flashed the message that they could not longer transmit because of international regulations, so no more Oprah, that was a pain. But truth be told we didn't spend that much time watching tv. It was irritatting that they had ESPN which was too tempting for the DH so he had it on sometimes and I didn't care to hear it. I am not a professional sports fan.
We wanted to book for next Spring Break but the dates don't work for us. DD will be 7 so I think we will do the parks next year before the magic totally wears off. In 2013 we will be done with making payments for her 529 account for college so I think we will celebrate not having to make that payment and having more $$$ with a Spring Break cruise.
I hope you enjoyed the FE cookies. Hopefully we will be shipping soon. Keep an eye out on the website if you are interested.
Best wishes to everyone,
Karen
It was great to meet so many of you!
All the years I have flown, I've never had a bag lost. We stayed at the Hyatt the night before the cruise and there were 2 more flights coming from Detroit after the one we were on. Sunday morning checked and they still had no idea where it was!
So a Sonya was suspose to call back after they traced it.
) who told me my bag never made it out of Metro Detroit airport! Told him to hold it as I were coming back today. And there it was waiting for us---never opened!(My zip tie was still on it.)
. We rebooked too -- for next summer to Canada. Don't know if we'll keep it. I was so surprised DH said to rebook, I really didn't think he was having too much fun 
but she still had fun 
bracing ourselves 
Time to get organized and get it all put away. Best of luck with your daughters wedding Deb T and Ness I hope your neighborhood is able to recover quickly. Yelena that celebrity cruise sounds AWESOME! Take care everyone, it was very nice getting to know you. Wendy
(I am trying to save one for our DS when he comes for a visit 
I am glad we met you on the CC, K. had fun swimming with Matthew (I hope he was not too tired after 2.5 hours of snorkeling). Your boys are so nice and polite 
