Magic Christmas Cruise 2010 (Dec 18th - 29th) **** PART III ****

[3princessMommy]

I would DEFINITELY object!!!!

 

[itutorfortravel]

It must have been so much fun to see her reaction!

We have not told our kids yet. Still holding out as long as we can.
We are planning on Dec 15th. But, there are days when I think... it would be much easier to tell them... so they could help me!

How are you going to tell your children about the cruise? We waited to tell DD because we were afraid if she knew too far in advance she would be pre-occupied with cruising and not remain focused on school! I just hope we didn't tell her too early! But I didn't want to wait any longer because I've had to decline some invitations on her behalf because we won't be here and I can just see someone asking her why she can't come to so-and-so and then she turns and asks me why she can't go! Plus, it was nice today being able to drag out all my clothes to try on without having to worry about stuffing them in a suitcase or back in the closet. I now have my guest room set up as the staging area for packing...clothes neatly folded on the bed or in the closet, etc. All out in the open!!!

 

[momssurprise]

Just got back from Michael's. They have a complete aisle of stocking stuffers, half of it is Disney stuff, all for $1.00 each! Plus I printed the online coupon for 15% complete purchase - good today only. Now I just need to figure out how to get everything in the suitcase and still have room for my clothes. DH says I don't have to pack clothes for him but others might object

Yay! Would you mind sharing where you found the 15% off coupon? I looked but couldnt find...

 

[disneydash]

Thanks for the heads up. My DW just found the coupon at the following link:

http://dealspl.us/michaels-coupons/180171p

She is now headed off to Michaels to find more FE gifts.

 

[minneapolismickey]

My zazzle BOTP shirt was rejected. I cut out my own Mickey Ears and scanned them into the computer for a logo on the pocket. They must look too real? I am bummed. Someone asked how long the order takes. They say 5-7 business days after processing. Processing is fast if it is white, simple, etc... I guess I'll try again.

My favorite thing on the cruise is the over the door hanger. We put everything in it! Ipods, sunglasses, medications, sunscreen, jewelry, you name it. Now we don't travel anywhere without it. I would definitely recommend the effort to go to Target for this storage savior!

 

[Liz Arjay]

Count me in too! I'm running the Half Marathon at Disney World on 1/8, so I'll be trying to get in a few miles any chance I get. I'm trying to keep realistic goals for this trip - try to run a little at least every other day and avoid gaining too much weight. I'd love to say that I'm going to religiously stick to my training plan, but I know that's not going to happen! If I can keep the weight gain in check, I'll be happy. I'll have to keep reminding myself that I don't want to run 13 miles with a ten pound weight strapped around my waist!

riggins - We are volunteering at the Disney Marathon weekend, so I hope we see you! I'll have to check my volunteer assignment - One day is hospitality tent and the other baggage claim. It is so inspiring to see all the runners!

Spent a long and beautiful day at Epcot yesterday. A fabulous Candlelight Processional with Isabella Rossilini (spelling?) reading the Christmas Story. The weather was delightfully balmy. The decorations were terrific.

My boss just booked the 12/30 Disney Wonder 7 day Eastern cruise. I think he got tired of all my cruise talk and wanted in on the action! He nicely gave me a Kindle as an early Christmas present so I will have reading material onboard. He is a good boss.

Walked 3 miles on the treadmill today, preparing for CC5k! I think the consensus was that anyone interested in the Deck 4 walking group would just meet on the hour at either 7, 8, or 9:00 and see if anyone else shows up. I suggested meeting on the shuffleboard court, and someone else said outside the doors of Animators - possibly they are the same spot.

All 3 kids' formal and semi-formal wardrobes have been tried on, cleaned, mended, shined, hemmed and accessorized. It is good to have that behind me.

Vika is so adorable!!

IceSk8ers Mom - that looks more like a cosmo than champagne...

Liz

 

[njmom23grls]

Hi Everyone! Wow! I was gone for a week and came back to 36 pages of posts . I've made it through Pg. 14 so forgive me if this was addressed at a later point. I took my mom on a last minute cruise for her "big number" birthday. We had a spectacular deal and spent last week on a southern caribbean with RCCL. (First with them for me) - One of our stops was St. Maarten - on the dutch side (Philipsburg) they take dollars widely and everything is much less expensive (official currency is florin (guilders?). The french side uses Euros but many things were 2 or 3 times the prices as on the dutch side which is part of the reason most people "shop" on the dutch side. Several restaurants (but not all) accepted the dollar on par with the Euro (!) - others made the conversion, and only one vendor in the Marigot market insisted on Euros which we didn't have - so don't stress about the Euros at least for St. Maarten.

Getting excited for Disney just a few weeks!
Lisa

 

[Three at Sea]

This is an updated list. Please let me know if you aren't on here. Also, I believe we are meeting before the 5K but I'm not sure where. Anyone have an idea?

tinkmischief
Mdargen
BBQMommy
colkath2005
Lyrah
miatamel
momssurprise
3princessMommy
pennymike
STLUCIELADY
SwimMama
pennymike
minneapolismickey
CamFamluvsDsny
Liz Arjay x2
IceSk8ersMom
StJohnfamily
Lolobellica

I am going to have to do some running while on the boat. I have a feeling all I am going to do is eat and drink!

Hi, can you please add me to the 5K list - Three at Sea....thanks!

 

[Three at Sea]

We told DD about the cruise yesterday. I think she was in shock. She didn't go crazy but actually almost cried. I have never seen that reaction before. She was THAT happy! I got the biggest hug and thank you I think I have ever gotten before.

QUOTE]

That sounds like an awesome response to such a great surprise. We're telling our DD9 on Dec 12 the news, but she is acting like such a brat lately I'm not sure I want to!

 

[mdargen]

The updated list. Not that I would know how to do this but should we let the boat know how many of us are doing the 5k? I don't think they usually get more than a dozen people at most. Should we warn them or just do it?


tinkmischief
Mdargen
BBQMommy
colkath2005
Lyrah
miatamel
momssurprise
3princessMommy
pennymike
STLUCIELADY
SwimMama
pennymike
minneapolismickey
CamFamluvsDsny
Liz Arjay x2
IceSk8ersMom
StJohnfamily
Lolobellica
riggins
Three at Sea

 

[miatamel]

My zazzle BOTP shirt was rejected. I cut out my own Mickey Ears and scanned them into the computer for a logo on the pocket. They must look too real? I am bummed. Someone asked how long the order takes. They say 5-7 business days after processing. Processing is fast if it is white, simple, etc... I guess I'll try again.

Do you know why it was rejected? Several weeks ago I made me and the girls an embarkation shirt and realized I never heard from them and so checked last night and they were "cancelled." Never heard a word from Zazzle about that so I was aggravated that they were cancelled AND that they didn't tell me. However, my BOTP tees are already en route.

I would have rather had our embarkation tees. Oh, well. But I shot them an email to voice my displeasure of cancellation without notification.
I was thinking you used one of the cliparts on site like the other designs so I was curious why yours was rejected.

 

[eve adkins]

Do you know why it was rejected? Several weeks ago I made me and the girls an embarkation shirt and realized I never heard from them and so checked last night and they were "cancelled." Never heard a word from Zazzle about that so I was aggravated that they were cancelled AND that they didn't tell me. However, my BOTP tees are already en route.

I would have rather had our embarkation tees. Oh, well. But I shot them an email to voice my displeasure of cancellation without notification.
I was thinking you used one of the cliparts on site like the other designs so I was curious why yours was rejected.

Stitches N bows make's cute embarkation tshirts and I believe she's having a cyber monday sale today...Might be worth checking out.

 

[Cam Fam luvs Dsny]

Let's try this again- I hope this link works -

http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?hl=e...d=109555197624262815802.000496288247dea7b89fa

The map looks great, thanks!

Our DD12 has done her entire schooling in French since gr. 1, so we are hoping to have her make good use of her skills. Often she tells us French is for school, not the real world, so this will be great for her. In Ottawa and Quebec (at least where we have taken her) there is too much English readily available to her.

 

[Cam Fam luvs Dsny]

Wow you all must be planning on going reeaaaally slow then


Got the last cabin # today - fishy list is finally complete!!

Thanks - we printed our labels just a few hours too early this evening! Should have waited just a little longer.

Thanks for all of your hard work on tracking this information!

 

[Cam Fam luvs Dsny]

riggins - We are volunteering at the Disney Marathon weekend, so I hope we see you! I'll have to check my volunteer assignment - One day is hospitality tent and the other baggage claim. It is so inspiring to see all the runners!
Liz

How about the Princess? We have participated in Marathon Weekend for the last 5 years, but after the not so beautiful weather last year, I signed up for the Princess instead this year.

riggins Walked 3 miles on the treadmill today, preparing for CC5k! I think the consensus was that anyone interested in the Deck 4 walking group would just meet on the hour at either 7, 8, or 9:00 and see if anyone else shows up. I suggested meeting on the shuffleboard court, and someone else said outside the doors of Animators - possibly they are the same spot. Liz

I hope we can figure this out. I can't clearly remember - does anyone know the answer to this? LeiLani suggested outside Animators.

Tracey

 

[Fyrmedic654]

Hi Everyone! Wow the board has been busy! We are officially leaving our house in 16 days! So exciting! We managed to get some Black Friday shopping done and the decorations up since our 3 year old insisted it had to get done for Santa since he would be visiting here too while we were gone.

We found the cutest Princess Dress for our daughter too.....Walmart has a TON of Tangled stuff and the purple dress is so darn cute! We are all very excited that it looks like it is one of the movies playing on the ship!


@ LeiLani Glad that you guys all made it to your destinations safely. Thanks so much for the packing cheat sheets you gave me....they have been a great help over the past few days! We are looking forward to seeing you guys again. Tsyenna asks me at least once a day if Brittany and Alyssa are going to be on "Mickeys Boat"! She definitely was very taken with them!

Is anyone else staying at the Residence Inn? I know alot of people have mentioned the Hyatt and Comfort Inn and Suites. We were going to stay at one of those but we are Silver Elite Members at the Marriott after a very lenghty stay after the birth of our son earlier in the year so we decided to stick with them to continue to get points. We will be there the 16th and 17th if anyone is staying there and interested in meeting up. We may head over to one of the DIS meets too if thats possible. I do have a question to throw out there though...."Does anyone have any experience with the hotel shuttle services where infants are concerned"? Do they make you provide a car seat or will they allow the infant to travel in your arms for the short distance? We really don't want to drag around our carseat with us since we will already have a stroller to drag around.... I was also thinking about hiring private transportation but if there are enough good experiences with the shuttle then we may not.

Also has anyone done the beach excursions in Barbadoes or St. Maarten? We have those booked but are now thinking about just doing our own exploring around port. Are they worth it? Any recommendations are greatly appreciated! I also read on the main cruise board that there may have to be ships over the next few weeks (busy with holidays) that may have to tender in St. Thomas....does anyone have experience with this. We wanted to go shopping and exploring there but wondered how difficult tendering would be with a stroller and small kids? I don't know for sure that Disney is one of these ships...I guess it just depends on how many ships are in port that day.





Christie

 

[mmi]

Hi Everyone! Wow the board has been busy! We are officially leaving our house in 16 days! So exciting! We managed to get some Black Friday shopping done and the decorations up since our 3 year old insisted it had to get done for Santa since he would be visiting here too while we were gone.

We found the cutest Princess Dress for our daughter too.....Walmart has a TON of Tangled stuff and the purple dress is so darn cute! We are all very excited that it looks like it is one of the movies playing on the ship!


@ LeiLani Glad that you guys all made it to your destinations safely. Thanks so much for the packing cheat sheets you gave me....they have been a great help over the past few days! We are looking forward to seeing you guys again. Tsyenna asks me at least once a day if Brittany and Alyssa are going to be on "Mickeys Boat"! She definitely was very taken with them!

Is anyone else staying at the Residence Inn? I know alot of people have mentioned the Hyatt and Comfort Inn and Suites. We were going to stay at one of those but we are Silver Elite Members at the Marriott after a very lenghty stay after the birth of our son earlier in the year so we decided to stick with them to continue to get points. We will be there the 16th and 17th if anyone is staying there and interested in meeting up. We may head over to one of the DIS meets too if thats possible. I do have a question to throw out there though...."Does anyone have any experience with the hotel shuttle services where infants are concerned"? Do they make you provide a car seat or will they allow the infant to travel in your arms for the short distance? We really don't want to drag around our carseat with us since we will already have a stroller to drag around.... I was also thinking about hiring private transportation but if there are enough good experiences with the shuttle then we may not.

Also has anyone done the beach excursions in Barbadoes or St. Maarten? We have those booked but are now thinking about just doing our own exploring around port. Are they worth it? Any recommendations are greatly appreciated! I also read on the main cruise board that there may have to be ships over the next few weeks (busy with holidays) that may have to tender in St. Thomas....does anyone have experience with this. We wanted to go shopping and exploring there but wondered how difficult tendering would be with a stroller and small kids? I don't know for sure that Disney is one of these ships...I guess it just depends on how many ships are in port that day.





Christie

Christie, we are booked at the Residence Inn, but not sure how early we will get in yet. My in-laws should be there in time for dinner if you are interested in meeting up with them. We are still trying to figure out if Ben has an exam on that Friday morning and if not whether we will skip out on Collleen's class Christmas party so we can start driving.

As for excursions, we haven't booked any, I hate for to book them and then the weather turn out rainy or too cool, so we are going to wing it once we get there, but I am going to be armed with info once I get on board. The only thing I am greatly interested in is swimming with the turtles in Barbados.

As to the shuttle situation, you can always have DH drive your bags over and drop you and the kids off, then go back and he can catch the shuttle. That's what we are planning to do. That way we don't have to unload/load/unload.

Camie

 

[jenedpey]

I also read on the main cruise board that there may have to be ships over the next few weeks (busy with holidays) that may have to tender in St. Thomas....does anyone have experience with this. We wanted to go shopping and exploring there but wondered how difficult tendering would be with a stroller and small kids? I don't know for sure that Disney is one of these ships...I guess it just depends on how many ships are in port that day.



Christie

The good news is that not only do we look like we are docking (Havensight-West Indian Company Dock), but we are the only large cruise ship in St. Thomas that day. The other cruise ship is the SeaDream with 55 Cabins, 110 passengers that is departing that day.

U.S. Virgin Island Port Authority
http://www.viport.com/shipschedules.html

has a schedule http://www.viport.com/documents/CRUISESCHEDULE_2010_2011_STTSTJ.pdf

Below are some of the other days, so we are lucky to be the only one on December 26th.
DATE DAY ARR DEP SHIP FROM TO IMM BER PILOT
21-Dec-10 Tuesday 8:00 18:00 EMERALD PRINCESS BAH ANT YES SS 7:15
21-Dec-10 Tuesday 8:00 17:00 EURODAM BAH SXM YES NS 7:00
21-Dec-10 Tuesday 10:00 20:00 CARNIVAL DREAM BAH SXM YES WICO 9:30
21-Dec-10 Tuesday 12:00 20:00 NORWEGIAN SUN BAH SXM YES WICO 11:30 WICO
21-Dec-10 Tuesday 8:00 17:00 CELEBRITY ECLIPSE SJU SXM NO WICO 7:30 WICO
22-Dec-10 Wednesday 8:00 18:00 CELEBRITY SOLSTICE SJU SXM NO SS 7:15 WICO
22-Dec-10 Wednesday 7:00 16:00 NORWEGIAN EPIC SXM BAH YES WICO 6:45 WICO
22-Dec-10 Wednesday 11:00 19:00 FREEDOM/SEAS BAH SXM YES WICO 10:30 WICO
22-Dec-10 Wednesday 9:00 18:00 CARNIVAL GLORY BAH SJU YES WICO 8:30
23-Dec-10 Thursday 7:00 16:00 RUBY PRINCESS SXM GTX YES SS 6:15
24-Dec-10 Friday 8:00 18:00 CRYSTAL SERENITY MIA BAR NO WICO 7:30 WICO
24-Dec-10 Friday 8:00 17:00 EXPLORER/SEAS DR BAR YES WICO 7:30 WICO
25-Dec-10 Saturday 7:00 15:00 PACIFIC PRINCESS FLL STL NO SS 6:15
26-Dec-10 Sunday 8:00 19:00 SEADREAM 1 BVI STJ YES NS 7:30
26-Dec-10 Sunday 7:15 15:45 DISNEY MAGIC MAR BAH YES WICO 6:45 WICO
27-Dec-10 Monday 7:00 18:00 CARIBBEAN PRINCESS SJU BVI NO SS 6:15
27-Dec-10 Monday 7:00 17:00 CARNIVAL VICTORY SJU DOM NO WICO 6:30
27-Dec-10 Monday 8:00 18:00 CELEBRITY SUMMIT SJU STX NO WICO 7:30 WICO
27-Dec-10 Monday 8:00 17:30 ADVENTURE/SEAS SJU STX NO WICO 7:30 WICO
27-Dec-10 Monday 8:00 22:00 SEADREAM 1 STT ANG NO STJ
28-Dec-10 Tuesday 8:00 17:00 WESTERDAM SJU BAH NO SS 7:00
28-Dec-10 Tuesday 8:00 18:00 CARNIVAL LIBERTY BAH SJU YES WICO 7:30
29-Dec-10 Wednesday 9:00 17:00 ALLURE/SEAS BAH SXM YES SS 8:00
29-Dec-10 Wednesday 8:00 18:00 CELEBRITY SOLSTICE SJU SXM NO WICO 7:15 WICO
29-Dec-10 Wednesday 9:00 18:00 NORWEGIAN PEARL DR BVI YES WICO 8:00 WICO
29-Dec-10 Wednesday 7:00 17:00 MSC POESIA FLL SXM NO WICO 6:30 WICO
30-Dec-10 Thursday 7:00 16:00 GRAND PRINCESS STK DR YES SS 6:15
30-Dec-10 Thursday 7:00 16:00 RUBY PRINCESS SXM GTX YES WICO 6:15
30-Dec-10 Thursday 8:00 18:00 CELEBRITY MERCURY ANT BLT YES WICO 7:30 WICO
31-Dec-10 Friday 8:00 17:00 MAASDAM GTU SXM YES NS 7:15
31-Dec-10 Friday 8:00 17:00 QUEEN MARY 2 STK NYC YES SS 7:00

Hope this helps
Ed

 

[skypixy]

Colette, yay for you!

Michelle, thanks for your hard work on the map; I am now excited for this port. Do you happen to recall what page your Martinique/Christmas link was on? I lost track...

Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving. I am a bit panicked about getting everything ready for the trip. Only two more weekends at home for us and they are both full with holiday events and an all day work trip on the 11th. And a daughter that is hopefully clueless!

Does anyone NOT use an over the door hanger? I seem to recall that we didn't really need to one we brought 5 years ago, but I see so much about them I'm trying to decide if I need to run by Target and get one?!

And how many swimsuits is everyone bringing? PJ's? Anyone bringing jeans? This cruising in December has me confused about clothes.

TIA. Happy Monday...excited to spend two Mondays on the ship. IF there is no loud clanging noise mentioned on the Main Board.

Only 2 more weekends at home & I am on call for both of them!
Here is your answer: 3 swimsuits, 1 pair of jeans (wearing a pair down on a/c), 1 sleepshirt w/pants (sometimes it gets cool in hotel/stateroom)

 

[Fyrmedic654]

@ ED Oh great! Thats great news to hear...I think my husband would of been pulling out the hair he doesn't have on his head if we were going to have to tender in St.Thomas! So definitely doing a dance for that!


@ Camie Meeting up sounds great! If your in-laws want too then we are definitely up for it! Hopefully you guys can make it too! We are leaving here on the 16th and hopefully getting there mid afternoon since its only a few hours away.



Christie