December 2,2006...Anyone want to join us?

[luvmykids]

Hi everyone I am sitting here waiting for the Maytag repairman who is supposed to show up between 12-5 to repair my oven. I have no choice but to wait as I have not had a working oven for 2 months (not that anyone in my house is complaining about not having to eat my cooking

Alwayslisad: Happy Anniversary!!! Have fun this weekend .

Tinkandsquirtsmom: Wow 95 degrees....yesterday I think our high was 70. I am looking forward to Saturday because we are supposed to reach 80 and we have our block party that day

If there is room for me I would be interested in tea with you at Palo.

Have a great day!

 

[PenskeSth1]

Tink&Squirtsmom: I had a teachers conf. with DS (8) teacher today. I informed her of our cruise and she made a note of it. She said that she wanted to come too! She asked that I remind her closer to our sailing date. I just wanted to give her a heads up early. She was really nice about it and said she would give him some work to take with us and he could do a journal entry for each day we are gone. (she said that would help in his writing) which is important for him this year. If he does not get at least a 2 on our states FCAT writing part of test he will be retained.

Our kids have been in school since the begining of Aug.

We are doing Palo's on Sunday night. I wanted to do it right away. I cannot wait to have there Souflee (Sp?)

Other than that I am slowly getting our pirate costumes together and working on door magnets and counting down the days.

Hope everyone has a great week, we are off to cub scouts!!

 

[princessdaisy]

Uggg, i am not looking forward to requesting days off of school for dd, 14. She usually gets a "contract" to complete all the work during vacation and the teachers are not so happy to have to put together the work (I always offer to help copy, staple, anything to try and make it easier for them). Choir teacher is fussy but I promise that she will sing daily in the shower!

Wish me luck, guys!!

 

[princessdaisy]

Luvmykids: Did the Maytag make it by to fix your stove that is too funny about the cooking...I wish my stove would break!

Oh, and of course, there is always room for the Tea! would love to talk to you and the others Are you originally from NY? I LOVE to hear accents! British, Australian, southern but the best is New Yorkers! I could listen to it all day

 

[luvmykids]

Princessdaisy: The maytag man came but he had to order parts for the stove so.......no cooking until next tuesday .
Yes, I am originally from Queens, NY which is a suburb of NYC and now I live on Long Island which is about 1 hour outside of NYC. Are you originally from California?

Today was busy with after school stuff and now I am off to pack backpacks for tomorrow.

 

[princessdaisy]

Yep, born and raised in San Diego, CA...dude


Oh and I went through my Disney shopping loot and have to return almost half of it as I didn't realize the sizes run so BIG...my bathing suit can fit two in it yikes and I'm not a little gal either.

 

[alwayslisad]

(in my best Robin Williams impression)
Goooooooooooooood MORNING DCL DIS'ERS!!!!!!!!!!

Ok so fall is in FULL BLOOM here in central NH! sheesh is it COLD!!

only 2 months 17 days for departure for my family - wahoo

I leave for Orlando for a business trip on 10/18 - should be a good time - we are staying at the OMNI in Orlando - holy magolie that place is huge!! My boss said she is up to trying to do something on the two nights we are there --- so maybe a trip to a DISNEY park or soemthing??? ohhh be still my heart!!!

DD talked to all her teachers already about the cruise. Most said ok, that it did put her at risk of falling behind, but her reply was "provide me with what you will be doing while I am gone during the Thanksgiving Break and I will have it done that monday before I leave....then I will actually be ahead" almost all of them were dumfounded! One person actually stated they didnt know if they could do that.... HMM hello?? I will contact the teachers mid October with a reminder for this and hope all goes as planned. DD is in 9th grade, but landed all Honors and Advanced classes - kinda good and kinda bad - good that she is that smart - bad that they move so fast cus they feel kids can keep up.....oh well - no matter what - we be cruising on 12/2 - glad we took two days off prior and two days off after - that way all is relaxed!!!

hope all are great this wonderful Wednesday - have a great day!!

 

[momof6innc]

I mentioned the cruise to the teachers on orientation day. They all (4 of them) said "remind me in November". So I will write them a letter for November 1st. I think it's a great idea to ask for the homework ahead of time. The kids won't mind doing extra work for a week. They didn't have any spring break because DH and I worked every single day of it (I was earning money for the cruise, of course), so there was no time to go anywhere. They know what the reward is, so they're OK with the work.

We were herded to Beach Blanket Buffet on our Wonder trip last time for lunch, and we walked right by Parrot Cay and it was too full. We all walked on the ship with our MAW t shirts, and wouldn't you know it, DD (the MAW kid) spilled orange macaroni and cheese all over hers!! We spent some time at the laundry room that week. I think I would prefer Topsiders, as it's outside. For those of you who have been to Parrot Cay for the Saturday lunch, why do you prefer it?

We went on our first Disney Cruise because DD requested that as her wish. A friend had just gone on one with her son for MAW, and she raved about it. We lived in Newport, RI at the time, and we saw all sorts of ships, cruise ships, yachts, in the harbor constantly, so I suggested to Emily that it would be fun for all of us to go on a cruise. Now, two years later, Emily will finish chemo in a month, so this cruise is our celebration. Some people have big parties when their kids come off of chemo, but we thought this was more appropriate for our family (hee hee!) And with most of my family coming with us (my DB and DSIL are expecting a baby in March and can't come), we'll have a celebration! No one knows but I ordered a celebration cake for our dinner the first night. I had to order a birthday cake, but I just have to talk to the servers and they can either pipe something different on it or just take off the birthday stuff (or so the DCL lady on the phone said).

I'm off to the disney online store to go shopping! DH's and my 13th anniversary is Saturday and we are being creative with $25 each this year (makes you think a bit harder about what to get). He has mentioned wanting a box to put his watches in (and yes, he owns a Disney watch!), and the box is on sale, plus there's a discount today. I'm also buying the plastic mickey picnic plates. The kids use those as regular dishes already. I bought the Santa Mickey dishes last January and took them out this weekend!! They look so neat! I'm really getting in the mood!

 

[luvmykids]

Princessdaisy: Thats too bad you have to return so much of the stuff you bought but I guess that gives you an excuse to do more shopping (my favorite hobby).

alwayslisad: That is great you get to go to Orlando soon on business....I hope you get to go to a Disney Park. When my DH goes to Orlando for business they usually take them into a park and sometimes set up a special behind the scenes tour for them. I hope you get to do something fun.

Momof6: Happy anniversary! Congrats on the upcoming end of your daughters chemo. I think it is great that you will have so much family on the cruise with you to celebrate.

Has anyone been to seven mile beach in Grand Cayman? Since we cancelled our stingray excursion I think this is what we will do there. If we book the excursion through Disney it costs about $125 just for transportation, one drink and a lounge chair. I was wondering if anyone has taken a taxi there and how much it costs.

Have a great day everyone!

 

[princessdaisy]

Momofsix: Have a wonderful Anniversary! and I am sure Emily is gonna be so excited to see her celebration cake congratulations to both of you.

I am glad to hear that the teachers are cooperating. I was disappointed in my dd's teachers last cruise as they made a pretty big stink about it.

We cruised a week before spring break and I asked if my dd could have the work a few days before we leaved and they huffed that they had no idea what the curriculum for that week would be but that they would come up with something. huh,???? they don't have a work plan a week ahead? so I guess they plan work for the students day by day??? geezzz

Ah, well, this is the last time we take her out of school as she will be in High School next year. She is a great student so I won't worry about it too much.

 

[princessdaisy]

Luvmykids: We did Seven Mile beach and took the taxi to and from...I think we paid 4 bucks a person and this was a few years ago.

The beach is very nice and there is an area with showers, little restaurant/bar. My son was only 2 at that time so we just stayed for about 3 hours and went back to ship for late lunch then shopping at GC stores

I would save the money and do it on your own...only thing is we didn't have any beach chairs, we just set out our towels on the sand and hubby & dd swam/snorkled while me and toddler played near the shore.

 

[luvmykids]

Princess Daisy: Thanks for the Grand Cayman beach info. I think we are going to definitly take the taxi on our own. Do you know if there are any beach chairs we can pay extra to get or can you only get them if you go as part of an excursion?

 

[princessdaisy]

Your welcome!

That is a good question...I remember seeing beach chairs/umbrellas. Might want to post that question on the cruise boards as they know everything over there

When we did the Eastern cruise, paid 10.00 bucks for a few beach chairs and umbrella on St. Thomas.

Your gonna enjoy Seven Mile beach as it is so pretty and the water is gorgeous


Steph aka Princess Daisy

 

[Tink&SquirtsMom]

Just booked my flights. Only $99 nonstop from CA...WOOHOO! Change of plans though, we are flying into Fort Lauderdale instead of Orlando (was gonna be way way more money, almost twice what we paid last time). We also decided to skip WDW since we were just at Disneyland last month. I think we're gonna do a few days at the beach following the cruise instead. Anyone been to Disney's Vero Beach?

momof6innc: Wow, I had no idea your dd was on chemo. That is a huge celebration that it is ending. I agree it a cruise sounds like the perfect way to party. Congratulations on your anniversary.

 

[Stewy]

Hi Everyone!

I already talked to DS (8) teacher . I told her on orientation day like momof6innc. She took it well, too. The school encourages quality, family time which works just fine for my travel plans.

We took our first cruise when DS was 5. I was on the website and they had a glitch that gave us a ridiculously low price but they honored it - they probably knew they would recoup the money on future trips. We surprised him with that one - 4 day land/3 day sea. Since then we have taken 2 more - another 3 and a 7 day western. Needless to say, after the first one we were hooked. Hooked so bad that I booked us on the return Panama Canal cruise but we wound up with a DS instead and he was not old enough last August to get on the ship so we switched it to this cruise. My DH suggested we do this cruise because I really want to see the ship decorated for Christmas.

I booked a couple of DCL excursions but I don't know how much I want to be limited to their transportation times with the baby. He will be 18 months when we go but there is no way he can hang on the beach all day. princessdaisy: Since the cab fare seems pretty cheap, was seven mile beach really close to the tender dock? When we went the last time we did the stingray swim and I walked around GC while DH snorkled and DS stayed in the club so I did not pay any attention to the beach options around us.

Thanks for any input.
Cheryl

 

[princessdaisy]

Hi Cheryl, I remember it not being very far at all...maybe a quick 10 minute ride to a real nice part of the beach. It was perfect for my ds...not to long of a drive and a fun time of playing in the sand & water.

I had a much easier time taking dd out of school for our first cruise on DCL eight year ago when she was six. In elementary the teachers loved that we got to go and spend family time together...I guess that goes out the window in middle school

 

[Tink&SquirtsMom]

He he, my dd is 6. Thats probably why we had such an easy time of it. Although she goes to a charter school now where each child gets their own individual lesson plan each day. So we really aren't making any extra work for the teacher. They would have had to do a separate lesson plan for her anyways.

I just booked Vero Beach for the 3 nights following the cruise. Hopefully we have good weather for it. I got a code of Mousesavers that brought the nightly rate down 20%. Based on the reviews its got a big heated pool, a beach with lots of shells, sea turtles (dd's favorite animal), and a pirate ship water play area for ds. I think they'll be happy! Now I have to figure out what to do the day before the cruise. We land at 8am Dec 1 in Fort Lauderdale.

 

[PenskeSth1]

Momof6: Congratulations on your upcoming Anniversary!

Tink&Squirtsmom: Vero Beach is our home resort for Vacation Club, we have never even been there but have heard good things about it. Hoping someday we'll get over there.

DD graduates this year so she will definitely need to bring some work with her to do during down time. She got all A's on her recent interm report so hopefully she will keep that up and won't have to worry to much while we are on vacation (that is as long as she brings work to keep up).
I'm not as worried about DS because he still is in Elementary school, although he needs to keep up on his reading because of our FCAT test in the spring. If he doesn't get at least a 2 on the reading part they will automatically retain him.

We ate at Topsiders buffet on our last cruise, I didn't know that PC was even open. of course it was our first cruise so we were just glad to be on the ship.

 

[princessdaisy]

Tink&squirtsmom: That is a great rate you got on your flights! how long will it take to get into Orlando? I have our tickets from San Diego to Orlando coming in Friday night...paid 225.00 each which I thought was pretty decent but that is not as good as 99.00

PenskeSth1: I remember on our first cruise that they sent us up to Topsiders. Its nice to be outside but I do prefer Parrot Cay on the first day except that they seat you with other people and that can be a bit awkward.

On last cruise a pair of twin older ladies sat with us and ignored us the whole time Maybe the fact that my then 2 1/2 year old had his finger in his noise might of had something to do with it hahaha! no just joking, that was my husband.

 

[PenskeSth1]

DD and I went up to Topsiders while DH went to sign Ds up for Oceaneers Club. We didn't mind eating at Topsiders because we could sit outside and see the Port and surrounding area. DH and Ds had no problems finding us up there. I guess we were lucky it wasn't real busy yet.

Most likely we will go to Topsiders again this time.

Princessdaisy: knowing my luck we would get stuck with stuffy old people who aren't amused by children too! DH would probably let out a huge burp and then I would turn all shades of red. (sounds like your DH is like mine) one big kid....