November 7, 2009 ~~~~ AHOY ST.CROIX ~~~~

[minniemouse71]

Inukshuk

I could never do that as everyone within 100 miles of me knows when I book a cruise!

Same Here!
I sometimes wonder if DH shouts it from the rooftop.

 

[inukshuk]

It was so hard not to say anything, I normally can not keep anythihg from my family. The hardest part was the lack of gifts for everyone at Christmas. I know the older girls thought what the heck, I know times are tough but this is crazy. My plan was to wait and tell everyone at dinner, but I couldn't wait.

I have booked the older girls in a CAT 11 has anyone ever been upgraded? My only concern is I requested a room near us.

Hope everyone is well, we are getting another storm today, UGH!
Jenn

 

[TiggerzFan]

Hi everyone,
Hi Christine and Donna, nice to see some familar names. I have booked two rooms. Can you request rooms with two beds?

Jenn

Wow, Jenn! What a nice surprise! Welcome aboard. So glad you'll be joining us.
Yes, you can request that the bed be split into two twins. Just have DCL, or your TA, put that on your reservation.

 

[Silly Little Pixie]

hey Jen! Good to see you are joining us!! Yea! DH remembers you as "the cute Canadian". Have your older girls ever done DCL? I didn't know your family got sick on the last cruise. Seasick, food poisoning, noro? My DH got sick too. I think it was food poisoning. He ate ribs on CC and the rest of us didn't. DD and I got food poisoning from ribs on our WDW pre-stay, so our new joke is don't eat ribs in Florida...

Christine

 

[inukshuk]

Hi Christine,
Your DH was so sweet, I remember talking to him on CC, he told me that your family had booked another trip. I can not believe of all the DC's that there is three of us on the same one again. Are you renewing your vows on this trip?
My older DD's have not been on DCL before. I am a little nervous because of their age 20, and 18. DD who is 18 is trying to talk us into letting her boyfriend come with us, so we will see how this all goes down. If anyone has any suggetions, or has traveled with kids in that age group let me know.
I thought Emily got sick from eating something at CC as well. That is the night she started to be ill. She never left the room the day we were at sea. Unfortunately it continued for 9 days. We had a post pkg planned at WDW with the christmas party, dinner at CRT and BBB. She made BBB and that was about it. We tried everything, and when we landed back in Canada we took her to the hospital that night. I was sick for about three days, and DH never got it. I feel sorry for who ever got our room, I hope they didn't get sick.
Thank you again for the wonderful FE gifts, that was truly a highlight for our trip.
Well take care everyone, we have another snow storm hitting us today.
Jenn

 

[Silly Little Pixie]

UGh sorry you got sick too! Blech. I am sure it was the food, because DH was sick on the sea day, still felt a little queasy the next morning, and was fine by the second night. The rest of us were fine. He NEVER gets sick. We felt so badly that he missed Animator's!

YES we are renewing our vows!! Wooohoooo on Castaway Cay! We can't wait. My inlaws, parents, and friend with her DH and 4 kids are joining us on this cruise too. I can't wait to make lots of magnets for everyone and SHIRTS this time! I haven't started looking into any excursions yet.

How fun to take your older girls! Do they love WDW too? Will you be doing a pre or post stay this time? I think the kids and I alone are doing a post stay this time. Depends on the deals they're offering, but hey, we're out of school that next week too and the flight is already paid for so why not...did you do the Christmas party? Has anyone? Is it worth it? I'm a little skeptical of paying that much money. At DL the holiday parades, fireworks, etc are all free when you go during the holiday season.

Christine

 

[LarryDEbJesJen]

Finally managed to snag enough credit card points to pay of the reservation.
We booked two guaranteed inside cabins. My wife and older daughter in one cabin and my younger daughter and myself in the other (snoring allowed) cabin. Im hoping to rack up more credit card points so we can hit up some of the shore excursions.

Bit about us: Deb 44, Larry 42, Jen 18 Jess 15. We live in Green Bay, WI and right now its 8 degrees below zero. This is our first out of Wisconsin family vacation ever so it should be interesting.

 

[glindamood]

LarryDebJesJen. Glad to have you aboard (yeah, pun intended) with us.

You are sort of just across the lake from us - I live in Cadillac MI. We are to have wind chill of 24 below tonight. We have had over 100" of snow so far this year as well. The cold makes me think the 20's and all that snow wasn't so bad after all.

 

[LarryDEbJesJen]

Right now its 0 out. wind chill -8. low of -12 tonight....This morning I crawled in the car and it read 8 degrees and i thought it this isnt too bad.

 

[glindamood]

Windchill is currently -15 with an actual temp of -4. I am SO glad that I have a warm cruise to think about and look forward to.

Has anyone been watching the trip reports and seen the comments on St. Croix? I certainly hope they get their act together before we get there. Some comments were OK and some not (like stay on the ship). I would like to get to Buck Island so may take the DCL excursion. I did look into another vendor but their refund policy isn't acceptable to me - if the ship doesn't get there, you loose and they charge anyway. None of the other islands do that to cruise passengers. I just have to keep remembering that cruise ships have not been there in a long time and maybe they will change their policies -or it is a DCL excursion for us.

 

[lanand3]

Windchill is currently -15 with an actual temp of -4. I am SO glad that I have a warm cruise to think about and look forward to.

Has anyone been watching the trip reports and seen the comments on St. Croix? I certainly hope they get their act together before we get there. Some comments were OK and some not (like stay on the ship). I would like to get to Buck Island so may take the DCL excursion. I did look into another vendor but their refund policy isn't acceptable to me - if the ship doesn't get there, you loose and they charge anyway. None of the other islands do that to cruise passengers. I just have to keep remembering that cruise ships have not been there in a long time and maybe they will change their policies -or it is a DCL excursion for us.

I am also watching them.My one and only cruise from 11 years ago we went to St Croix and it is a good memory,so I 'm hopefull.However,worst case we stay on the ship and enjoy the pool,etc w/less crowds

 

[kstategrad]

Hi everyone!

Looks like we'll be joining you on this cruise, too! This will be our 3rd Disney Cruise; the last one was in October 2007. We were gonna do the Transatlantic in Sept. '10, but it didn't work out. So...here we are!

It'll be me (Julie), DH (Ron), DS12 (Ethan), and DS8 (Seth). We're from Tennessee, as I see some of you are, too!

We're doing a few days at WDW before the cruise, so we'll really be looking forward to those "sea" days to rest our legs after trekking through all the parks.

Looking forward to getting to know you all!!

Julie

 

[glindamood]

Julie and family!!

Lovely weather here - 12 below and snowing. We are supposed to get 6 inches today.

Have a great weekend - don't think I am going anywhere today.

 

[glindamood]

Page Three??? No way.

I hope that everyone had a great weekend and you are all ready for a new week. It just means we are one week closer to it being our turn!

 

[TiggerzFan]

Good thing we're not cruising this week! Tonight is going to be 31 here in Central Florida!

 

[AverysMommy]

Well, I always grew up with real trees, and I love them! DH grew up with an artificial tree and preferred that. For many years we had the real tree. Our house now has a vaulted ceiling in the living room, so we were spending a fortune on huge trees, and the cats were dragging the pine needles everywhere! And inevitably the tree would dry out, too. So a few years ago we got a big, beautiful fake tree. Not pre-lit, because I prefer LOTS of little colored lights on my tree. So we still have to string the lights. And frankly, putting it up and taking it down takes as much time as it did before. No nice smell either!! But I couldn't afford to keep getting 9 1/2 foot trees, and we have so many ornaments!!! Many I have made with the kids, and we collect ornaments from all our trips as well. So we need a big ole tree!

Christine

Been away for a while so I need to respond to some old ones.

I certainly understand why people go to Artificial Trees - I bet I was a good 3 hours cleaning up after I took the tree out in early January. What a pain

But one thing I noticed this year - is that the prices really had dropped on trees. I bet in 2006 and 2007 I spent over $60 for each tree - this year we got a great tree for about $25.

I bet we will see lots of prices falling over the coming months.

Better get reading - have lots to catch up on here

Jessalynn

 

[AverysMommy]

Merry Christmas everyone! Tomorrow my kids get their big reveal ... They find out about the cruise! I have a scavenger hunt all ready, and the kids will put together a puzzle with a picture of the ship at CC and text added that has our cruise dates on it.

I'm so excited!!!!
Christine

You are such a cool mom for doing all this - they are lucky kids

 

[AverysMommy]

I hope that you all had a very special holiday with your families and friends. Ours was nice as well, even though I didn't get home to Ohio to see my folks. Just lousy weather all the way around and I was not willing to risk not getting back - for the holiday or work. Drew has gone off to work at Boy Scout camp while the oldest and his fiancee are with her family and then will travel to Chicago for NYE. To be young again....

Is anyone thinking about MVMCP before our cruise? I got all excited and then looked at the dates again and I just don't think it would work out based on this year's dates. I was looking at the December dates and thinking I was looking at November - dang. But, I guess I can wait until they post the dates and see. We would have to add a day after the trip to go by the looks of it and I don't know if I am willing to wait that long to book my airfare since I would like to fly on FF miles. Traverse City doesn't get that many and that is my preferred airport since it is only about 50 minutes from the house. Guess we shall see.

I wish you all a very Happy New Year!

We are looking at staying a week afterwards as well so not sure if we will get in the Christmas party - Iwoudl love to as I have never seen it

Is it good? We liked the Halloween party - we went in 2007

 

[AverysMommy]

Hope that everyone had a great Holiday. We did, until today, my husband called me at work and said that the police were on their way to our home, someone had scaled a six foot chain link fence, kicked our back door in and took our flat screen t.v. a jar with about $180.00 in change that we were saving for our vacation, a bottle of vicadin, my laptop, and emptied my jewelry boxes. We had to have someone come and board up our back door and now I am afraid that they will come back while we are sleeping tonight, so I will probably be up all night. All of this in broad daylight. Needless to say, we have now ordered a security system that will be installed before the end of the week. What a nightmare!!

OH MY GOD - thats awful....my home was broken into 20 years ago - and it really shook me for a long time.

The good news is that they dont go back very often - they move on to new targets.

I hope they caught the bas**rds

 

[glindamood]

I certainly understand why people go to Artificial Trees - I bet I was a good 3 hours cleaning up after I took the tree out in early January. What a pain

Jessalynn

Welcome back Jessalynn! It wasn't the immediate clean up that really did me in - it was the needles I missed and stepped on in my bare feet months later that did it.