December 21st, 2018, Part 3
Once I got those two suitcases unpacked, it was time for the tween meetup in D Lounge.
Sadly, only a few tweens made it but Kira did end up meeting a girl, whose mom had posted on the FB page and I had recognized. Kira was super shy but I encourage her to go off with her and chat until the safety drill, which was now only about 45 minutes away so she did and I was hopeful that she had found a buddy for the cruise.
The girl and her mom were very sweet and friendly, so fingers crossed.
She arrived back before we had to make our way down to deck 4.
This was actually one of the quickest safety drills I can remember having. It was sunny but since it was still cool out, Rob and Kira didn't mind and I was able to find a little patch of shade in the very back.
We waited until the crowds dispersed and then I suggested we walk up to deck 5 to see if our last suitcase was there so we did and there it was
Now I could finish my unpacking and toss those suckers under the bed
Word of warning for those of you who switch rooms at check-in, all of your luggage is still labeled with your old room numbers and while you can tell your room host about your switch and he/she will get your luggage for you, your room host has a billion things to do that evening and might not get around to it until much later so I always suggest that you head to your original stateroom and grab it yourself!
Also, keep in mind that if you do switch, your
Castaway Club gift, dining tickets, excursion tickets and any in-room amenities will be delivered to your old room so you will have to notify your room host about that so they can arrange for those items to be sent to your new room.
So, while it can be fun to get a better room at check-in, just keep in mind that some stranger may be partaking in that lovely cheese tray and champagne you gifted yourself
Back to the room where we noticed that all of our provisions had been loaded onto the ship so we would be sailing soon.
A few minutes later, we pushed off from the pier...
Rob tends to "over-love" sometimes and often ends up choking Kira, to her detriment and voiced concerns
Here's a better one, according to Kira, with less Daddy love
We were headed up to deck 9 for the sail away when Kira told us that she was just going to stay in the room, just as she switched on the TV and found those darn Mickey cartoons.
Really?
Come on, come watch the sail away with us, we're going to wave to Nancy & Chuck
Nope, she didn't want any part of it.
Ooookay, so off we went.
After a quick wave to the webcam, where, according to Nancy, the camera guy still needs to work on his technique as, once again, he only zoomed up on some cabins, instead of the top decks full of people
After Nancy confirmed by text that she couldn't see us, we moved over to the other side of the ship.
We saw Kira's new friend with other tweens having fun, eating ice cream and enjoying the sail away party
Rob and I saw tons of dolphins in the water, too bad our kid didn't join us
We watched as we sailed away from Seawolf Park, a place we intended on visiting this trip after the cruise but never got the chance due to the weather. Oh well, next trip
We headed to the front of the ship to watch us sail out of the channel but it was super cold and windy and Rob was freezing so we didn't stay long.
I hadn't had a huge lunch so I was getting snackish...
So I got myself a little snack.
It took me a bit to figure out how to eat a hot dog with my braces but I did it and it was delicious! So delicious that I made sure to eat this "snack" daily as a second lunch, which you totally need on a cruise, right?
Right!
Sounds weird but I'm a girl with simple tastes and my daily hot dog and fries was the best thing I ate those entire 6 days
I'm pretty sure my kid had the same thing for lunch every day. There's just something about the food at Pete's Boiler Bites I guess
The kids pool deck though is always soooo busy and chaotic that I always brought it back to the room to eat in peace and quiet.
If you don't know me by now, I am soooo not a crowd person. I've never enjoyed crowds but as I get older, I've noticed that it actually affects my mood and I get super stressed when I am in a busy, crowded space. And when I get stressed, it triggers my Lupus and it makes me ill.
I know, you're probably thinking that I am a crazy person since I love Disney parks and cruises, which is basically full of crowds but there are definitely ways to avoid crowds at Disney and it's actually much easier to do on a cruise.
Avoiding the area near the kids pool is tip # 1 to avoiding that chaotic atmosphere.
Thankfully, we are only three short decks down from the aft elevators so we did a lot of stairs and spent a lot of time in our room.
And I always made sure to bring back our dishes up to the eating area. Your stateroom host will do it for you when they make up your room but I always feel bad about leaving an extra mess for them and we're always up there anyway, so it's just easier for us to do it ourselves.
We enjoyed a gorgeous sunset from our balcony
Kira left for a bit and returned shortly with her third (?) ice cream of the day
As the sun set, it started to get a little chilly but we stayed out there until the last minute before we had to leave for the variety show in the Walt Disney Theatre.
I've noticed that Disney seems to be going away from the Welcome Aboard show that is typically played in the WDT on the first night, which gets a
from me
I had asked Kira if she was joining us and at first she said no, she was going to skip it and stay in the room. I HIGHLY encouraged her to see it, either with us or to text her new friend and see it with her.
I think I "encouraged" her enough to get mad at me and leave the room and eventually text her friend because Rob and I headed to the theatre and after grabbing seats in the second row, we noticed Kira and some other tweens in the front row.
Not that you can actually see her in this terrible photo but this is Ashley, our cruise director. She's one of my faves actually.
And a quick, sneaky pic of a fellow Canadian, Michael Harrison, who has been performing on Disney cruises almost as long as we've been sailing with them! We've seen him perform several times but it had been a few years so we checked him out anyway. Sadly, his act hasn't changed much...at all!
Kira loved it because she had never seen him and she loves to laugh and his show is definitely aimed at kids and Rob enjoyed it because he doesn't even remember him.
For me, it was good but I don't feel the need to see him again anytime soon.
Definitely worth going if you haven't seen the show though
We headed back to the room, having passed my favourite Christmas tree. Still in it's same place and looking as good as ever
Just as Rob and I were chatting about how we might actually get some alone time this cruise, we arrived to find....
Our kid...back in the room...watching TV.
She was happy to be in the upper bunk
While I unpacked that last suitcase earlier, I had given Rob the task of hanging the lights that I had brought.
One of our favourite memories of the first two Christmas cruises was laying in bed at night, snuggling, watching the strands of pretty Christmas lights that I had hung up in the room.
Such a simple but wonderful memory and I knew that on this cruise I would plus that up a little so I ended up getting a whole crap-load of lights this time
Pictures don't do it justice, our room was LIT!
It was sooo pretty in there!
We decorated both "sides" of the room and hung up our
DCL xmas decorations that we got on that first xmas cruise so our room was definitely more Christmassy this year
We snuggled in bed, enjoying our lights until it was time for dinner.
Please know that we only used magnets to hang the lights. The ceiling is magnetic and heavy magnets will do the trick, do not use tape or glue or anything else
Edited to add: We also hung lights on our door and on the handrail next to our room. I had also brought some lights to put on our Fish Extender but when I was decorating our door, I realized that I had made the boneheaded mistake of forgetting to pack our FE!!!
I rarely forget something because I have lists for my lists but apparently, "Fish Extender" never made it onto my lists because I had left it in my workout room in the basement.
We don't participate in the FE gift thing anymore but we still like to hang it up and often sneak a few little presents in there for Kira.
Well, I won't make that mistake again.
I was surprised to see you already started your trip report. As we were driving into Calgary for Xmas to visit the dd and seen planes taking off...I was wondering if you were in one of those on your way to warmer climates. I hope from your title of the report that you have a fantastic time. I'm just glad to be along for the ride. Just needing to see and hear of trips in warmer climates instead of the cool/cold winter grossness that is surrounding us here in northern Alberta
Can't wait to read the rest of your report!
These darn kids, growin' so fast!!
Warm tub still fun though 
10pm for pool closure.....darn it, why do they still do it so early??? 11pm like the adult pool I think would be a wonderful idea!
Love those waffle pics too!
