Not Eating in the Resturants

[cherice95403]

We were only able to get the late sitting and I KNOW that will never work for us. My kids like to eat around 5pm and would never last that long. My guess is that we will eat on deck and go to the early show.

My question is, should I tell someone I won't be there each day? Thanks!

 

[PrincessShmoo]

We were only able to get the late sitting and I NOW that will never work for us. My kids like to eat around 5pm and would never last that long. My guess is that we will eat on deck and go to the early show.

My question is, should I tell someone I won't be there each day? Thanks!

Have you requested to be placed on the wait list for early seating? That's your first step. Then give DCL a call (or your TA will do this) every couple of weeks to "confirm" the request is there. If it hasn't come through by the time you board, go immediately to where the dining changes are being handled on embarkation day and make your request again. Most times these steps will get you switched. Sometimes it doesn't.

It would be nice to let your head server know that you aren't going to be there. Just not showing up can delay your service team from starting other tables within their service area, unless they know you aren't going to be there.

I see that you're from California. You know that 8:00 pm will be 5:00 to your bodies, right? It's not that late to be eating.

 

[lbgraves]

Yes. This is because if you are seated with other guests your servers will wait for you to show up to start taking everyone's order. However, you should still plan on tipping the servers for the cruise. This is because the way DCL sets things up, your dinner servers are the ones you tip. Those same servers staff the MDRs, buffet, & quick service locations onboard during the rest of the day.

 

[JTBE]

Do not be discouraged. We booked 6 mos out before our first cruise and had late seating and we went with another family. We requested to be placed on the waiting list for first seating About 75 days out before both of our families were moved to first seating. We did not call every 2 weeks. We may have called once every other month to check our status.

 

[PrincessShmoo]

Do not be discouraged. We booked 6 mos out before our first cruise and had late seating and we went with another family. We requested to be placed on the waiting list for first seating About 75 days out before both of our families were moved to first seating. We did not call every 2 weeks. We may have called once every other month to check our status.

I only suggested every couple of weeks, because their cruise is so close. We also requested the wait list for early seating on our B2B cruises that we booked 3 months out. We didn't call, however, because it wasn't that important. If we got it, fine. If not, also fine.

We were switched to early seating on the first leg about a month later. The second leg we were switched about a week out from the first cruise start.

 

[cherice95403]

We booked in Feb so our options were limited. Our travel agent did put us on the wait list for early dining and I plan to check on it when we get on board, but I am just assuming it won't happen and planning accordingly. Prior to our cruise we will have spent 7 nights at WDW so I am guessing our body clocks would have adjusted

 

[PrincessShmoo]

We booked in Feb so our options were limited. Our travel agent did put us on the wait list for early dining and I plan to check on it when we get on board, but I am just assuming it won't happen and planning accordingly. Prior to our cruise we will have spent 7 nights at WDW so I am guessing our body clocks would have adjusted

I still suggest your TA call DCL periodically to "confirm" the request is there (remember the squeaky wheel?).

 

[Stephylynn02]

Everytime we have been waitlisted we have got 1st seating. Dinner in the dining rooms is amazing... so much fun and not to be missed!

 

[MC0810]

I also wanted to add a bit of encouragement regarding kids...mine also eat every day at 5pm and go to bed by 8pm every night..however when we are on vacation whether it is wdw or on a different cruise line they stay up much later than I expect and always surprised me. Even when they were really little. So if they cant change your dining seating to earlier still give the main dining rooms a try..your kids may surprise you.

 

[bumbershoot]

I see that you're from California. You know that 8:00 pm will be 5:00 to your bodies, right? It's not that late to be eating.

Great point.

Prior to our cruise we will have spent 7 nights at WDW so I am guessing our body clocks would have adjusted

Maybe. Maybe not. We're usually hitting a wall around day 4, but it still doesn't put us all the way onto eastern time. Generally takes about 2 weeks of trying for that to get there fully. Will you be trying to get yourself fully onto eastern time?

We also end up in a funky state on cruises where we are just SO full all the time that trying to get us "empty" for early dinner takes an effort. there are so many opportunites to eat. I still don't remember ever eating *lunch* on a cruise, because I'm not hungry and I don't want to mess with my dinner. (I actually like early dinner because then DS goes to the kid's club and we all have a span of some hours to play, rather than splitting it up. we aren't Disney show people and rarely go to the shows.)

But still, keep on trying to change the time if you wish to.

 

[DISNEY FANTASY]

I see that you're from California. You know that 8:00 pm will be 5:00 to your bodies, right? It's not that late to be eating.

This is one of those terrible myths spread around that cause families so many issues the time difference has No effect at all.

On the cruise ship the kids will be up with the sun on local time. In fact if they have gone to the WDW parks or stayed on Florida a few days pre cruise they will be on Florida time.

They will eat breakfast local ship time, they will eat lunch local ship time say 12 noon to 1.30 pm ( or if getting off in port eat local time) then there expected to swap back to West coast time for dinner some seven hours post lunch but go to bed at local ship time?

This advice causes kids to have meltdowns at dinner.

The OP is sensible she wants main dinner with kids this is just going to confuse it all.

 

[jpeppers]

I'm on the west coast and it takes us one day to adjust to the time change and late dining is way too late for me. I have other things I want to be doing in the evening. My 1st year I had late dining and wouldn't have gone but we got it switched after the 1st night. I did still tip my late servers even though I never saw them plus tipped my servers on the 2 early meals. I would just let the servers know the 1st night (after trying to get switched on board). If you don't you will do fine eating on the pool deck or you can get the same food at Cabanas.

 

[DISNEY FANTASY]

I'm on the west coast and it takes us one day to adjust to the time change and late dining is way too late for me. I have other things I want to be doing in the evening. My 1st year I had late dining and wouldn't have gone but we got it switched after the 1st night. I did still tip my late servers even though I never saw them plus tipped my servers on the 2 early meals. I would just let the servers know the 1st night (after trying to get switched on board). If you don't you will do fine eating on the pool deck or you can get the same food at Cabanas.

Agree we are from the UK, taking the time zone advice means we have breakfast at 2 am, lunch at 7 am and Dinner at 1pm.

Food eaten late is not good for children eat then straight to bed it will get pre teenagers ill.

It's a shame to miss MDRS that's the best food on the ship are the premium places if Remy and palo, and you have the Animators shows. Getting on a waitlist often works.

 

[DISNEY FANTASY]

We were only able to get the late sitting and I KNOW that will never work for us. My kids like to eat around 5pm and would never last that long. My guess is that we will eat on deck and go to the early show.

My question is, should I tell someone I won't be there each day? Thanks!

Back to your question if you do not use the MDRs it will be nice to tell someone as it frees up a table for others.

 

[mmouse37]

Agree we are from the UK, taking the time zone advice means we have breakfast at 2 am, lunch at 7 am and Dinner at 1pm.

Food eaten late is not good for children eat then straight to bed it will get pre teenagers ill.

It's a shame to miss MDRS that's the best food on the ship are the premium places if Remy and palo, and you have the Animators shows. Getting on a waitlist often works.

Eating early or late is a personal preference. How can you make a general statement that children or teenagers that eat late will be ill. That is just not true. We have eaten late on all our cruises except our first and our kids never had any illness by eating late dinner. There are thousands of children each week that eat late on DCL and if there was rampant illness after late dinner I am sure we would of heard of it. To us the benefits of eating later outweigh eating early. OP if you want to eat early fine but please don't think eating late is bad for you.

MJ

 

[DISNEY FANTASY]

Eating early or late is a personal preference. How can you make a general statement that children or teenagers that eat late will be ill. That is just not true. We have eaten late on all our cruises except our first and our kids never had any illness by eating late dinner. There are thousands of children each week that eat late on DCL and if there was rampant illness after late dinner I am sure we would of heard of it. To us the benefits of eating later outweigh eating early. OP if you want to eat early fine but please don't think eating late is bad for you.

MJ

Understand.

But general medical fact is do not go to bed on a full stomach, let it go down first.

If you eat at 6 pm and go to bed at 10pm then it has four hours to " go down" if you eat 8 pm > 10 pm and go you bed at 10.30pm, It has not had time to digest. It is not good for you.

Now adults may prefer eating late as they go to bed later, fine, if you eat at 8 pm at home fine, but saying a time difference will help you is totally wrong. Now children are far more sensitive, their eating more on a cruise ship, and drinking more pop soda, and we pump them up during the day, their up early doing new things in clubs or the pools, they get over tired.

To give them a meal pre teenager, at 8 pm, when they are likely to be over tired from the day, and eat a full meal or child's meal and then go to bed straight away is asking for trouble, they are over full, the food doesn't digest before sleep and they will be up with an upset tummy overnight, or be sick.

Now if you ask any medical professional they will say let food go down first, they say that breakfast is the most important meal as we burn it off, then lunch as we are awake but they say we get it all wrong by eating our main food in the evening when we do not burn it off it turns more to fat, and lays on your stomach overnight.

Research shows eating late has a connection with Type 2 diabetes.Dr Satchidananda Panda, the a leadIng author, said that at certain times of day the liver, intestines and muscles are at peak efficiency, while at other times they are ‘sleeping’. He added: ‘Every organ has a clock. Those metabolic cycles are critical.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/a...S-make-fat-researchers-say.html#ixzz3WL7CrPrL
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I bet you and everyone here knows the feeling of going to palo dinner over eating and being too full to sleep after however on brunch you can work it off.

In the end the parents should do what they feel best these boards are all just opinions.

http://t.today.com/health/eating-late-night-may-disrupt-learning-memory-2D80504709

http://t.today.com/health/eating-late-night-may-disrupt-learning-memory-2D80504709
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2014/11/15/dangers-late-night-eating.aspx

http://www.webmd.com/diet/diet-truth-myth-eating-night-causes-weight-gain

http://www.shape.com/healthy-eating/diet-tips/it-okay-eat-past-8-pm

 

[cherice95403]

Back to your question if you do not use the MDRs it will be nice to tell someone as it frees up a table for others.

Thank you! I definitely will let them know. We are a family of early morning risers. It's normal for my whole family to be up by 5:30am, even on weekends This works great for getting us to rope drop, but after a couple of days, I do think we would have somewhat adjusted because we will also be staying up late and pure exhaustion will take over. I will play it by ear and if the kids are up for it, I'll take them to late dinner (assuming we can't get early seating). But I know my kids and if they WANT to eat early, I'm not going to force them to wait because that is just bad for all. I definitely don't want to bring crabby kids into the dinning room!

Thanks for all the replies!

 

[KristiMc]

Eating early or late is a personal preference. How can you make a general statement that children or teenagers that eat late will be ill. That is just not true. We have eaten late on all our cruises except our first and our kids never had any illness by eating late dinner. There are thousands of children each week that eat late on DCL and if there was rampant illness after late dinner I am sure we would of heard of it. To us the benefits of eating later outweigh eating early. OP if you want to eat early fine but please don't think eating late is bad for you.

MJ

I agree with this. We have been cruising since my youngest was 7 and we always have late dining and he does just fine. He is usually done eating by 9-9:30 and then heads off to the clubs where he stays till they close. OP - I wouldn't skip late dinner. If your kids are hungry earlier get them a snack. Have the waiters bring out their dinners early and then they can head off to the clubs and you and your husband can enjoy the rest of your dinner.

 

[DISNEYFOS]

You know your kids, I would try to switch if you can. We had the late seating because we were traveling with all other adults. My kids didn't handle it well. They were looking for food at 5...and then my 6 year old would fall asleep on my lap in the dining room. They can stay awake at the parks late while we are on vacation..but dining isn't exactly as exciting for kids She ate mostly at the grill by the pool....and huge donuts for breakfast the next day (she still talks about the donuts)

 

[NYIceQueen]

I'm not going to get into a health debate; however, just keep in mind every "body" is different. My DH travels a lot on business. Sometimes it's Europe and he's really ahead, other times it's Seattle and he's "behind". It usually takes him a couple of days to get used to it on either side of things.

(this reminds me of the debunked "don't eat anything at all before swimming" our parents used to harp on all the time)

Each body is different.

My kids have late nights sometimes. Unfortunately that means a late 8:30 dinner and then bed within an hour. They're healthy, happy, no upset stomachs, and it's all good. Other times we eat at 6 and by 8:30 they're ready for a snack. However, I know if we had a 5:30 dinner time or something like that, my kids wouldn't do well with that at all.

There is no right or wrong answer, because you're the parent and you're the only one who knows your kids. I second the suggestion that you should just get on a wait list for the first dining if you feel that's what's correct for your kids. More than likely they'll get it - a lot of people like second dining because they're not racing back to the ship, so you may find people switching out of the first dining to second because they don't want to feel rushed.

If your kids don't eat fancy things, the same chicken fingers and fries they'd get in the MDR are available at the quick service, so they won't see a difference.

You could also feed them quick service, then take them to the kids club and then you can eat at the MDR by yourselves while they play. Just let your server know so you don't hold things up for other guests.

And more importantly, don't sweat it and have fun