More family activities if late seating?

[BethA]

We have early seating for our June 26 cruise, but after looking at recent navigators it seems you miss a lot of shows and activities for families. We did late seating before but after eating I was so tired thought we'd try earlier, but now I'm not sure. Anyone have any feelings on this. I know later in the evening there are no real family activities. Also when we had late my son would miss the club when he went to the main shows with us.
With early seating is there anything anyone fit in before the show or any suggestions for after the show for families. I thought I remembered most things being repeated for both seating groups, but the navigator I looked at didn't appear that way to me.

thanks for any help. We are traveling with my parents, brother and his wife and 4 kids-ages 18, 15, 13,9 and my husband and our 2 kids-15 and 8.

Also will they allow the 18 year old to go to teen things with my son and his brother?

Beth

 

[traycie2201]

HI Beth A, we had been waitlisted for early seating with DS13 but after reading the boards figured we'd go for late seating as we wouldn't have to rush back from ports etc, we'd see the show before dinner so after dinner finished around 10pm we could go to bed or off to a bar etc.

Early dining is very popular with people with young children so you may find that you have diners near your kids own age in the late dining, obviously it's a personal choice and you know your'e kids limitations best.

Not sure about the 18 year old joining in the teen club but you can ask on board, however bonus is that they can go to Palo at 18 !

Happy Cruising.

 

[debm]

I think it depends if you want your kids to eat with you or not. The kids with you are old enough that they can go in and out of the clubs when they want and could certainly handle the late seating. I think the late seating is less rushed. I hated being dressed and to dinner by 6PM. If you have late seating the shows don't start until 6:30 and if you don't want to dress until after the show you have at least 1 hour before dinner, after the show. Some of the shows were only 45 minutes. We just got off the May 1st Eastern. It was possible to do a family activity after the show and before dinner. This time a couple of my kids did get really tired at dinner but they were getting up earlier than they were used to. But we are one of the strange families with kids that like the late seating. Ours are 10, 8, 5, and 18 months. Whatever you decide will be fine though. Enjoy! Debi

 

[JenLynn]

We had early seating on our recent cruise and it seemed like everything worked out pretty well for us ..

6:00 - dinner
7:45 - Family cabaret show
8:30 - Walt Disney Theater show

Also, some of the special evening events in the kids club seemed to work better for us with this seating (keep in mind my kids were in the 5-7 age group, not sure how it is scheduled for others). But things like the Aloha Luau was from 8-9:45pm and Goofy's PJ party was from 7:30 to 9:30pm ... That worked well for our early seating.

There were always things that we missed, but that wouldn't have been helped if we had switched seating ....

For example, one night there was a game of Family Pictionary at 6:30 that we missed because we were at dinner, but if we had been late seating we would have been at the 6:30 version of that evening's show anyway .... so either way you'd have to skip something.

I say stick with the time that works best for dinner for your family. There are a variety of activities scheduled at a variety of times and you just can't do everything - as much as you may want to.


JenLynn

 

[meneelyb]

What a coincidence BethA. We share the same cruise date, the same first name and my family is traveling with my parents, my brother and his wife and kids. My family may check the boards and get us confused. By the way-my middle initial is A too! June 26th can't come soon enough.