September 19, 2010 - anyone?

[Jey12]

So excited there are going to be so many 4 year olds on the ship! I might never get my DD out of the clubs. LOL. This is our first cruise and I am such an overplanner with too much time on my hands to plan! If I have less than a month then I don't overthink things. Any tips from anyone? We are staying the night before at the Radisson at the Port and are hopefully going to be on the first shuttle out in the morning to the Disney Terminal. Also what are FE's and what do you need to do to make them? Looking forward to finally getting my sea legs!

 

[UGAFan0829]

So excited there are going to be so many 4 year olds on the ship! I might never get my DD out of the clubs. LOL. This is our first cruise and I am such an overplanner with too much time on my hands to plan! If I have less than a month then I don't overthink things. Any tips from anyone? We are staying the night before at the Radisson at the Port and are hopefully going to be on the first shuttle out in the morning to the Disney Terminal. Also what are FE's and what do you need to do to make them? Looking forward to finally getting my sea legs!

I'm glad to know that you're so excited! I think you will definitely love it!! Since I've never actually participated in a FE exchange, I figured I would post this link that could probably give you more info than if I tried to explain it:
http://www.disboards.com/showpost.php?p=33184281&postcount=2

 

[Crystal_27]

Regarding the FE exchange, I will tell you guys that we had a blast doing it on our 7 nighter. With that said, we had 40 cabins participating and it was a LOT of work and took several hours to complete. With our smaller group, I think it would be a lot of fun (it really was a way to share some DIS love). On our 7 nighter, we also did a DIS PJ breakfast, which was a ton of fun too. Some of us more die-hard folks also participated in a Secret Mickey exchange (think Secret Santa). It really was a unique cruise experience running into DISers at every turn - it felt like we had friends everywhere!

 

[UGAFan0829]

Regarding the FE exchange, I will tell you guys that we had a blast doing it on our 7 nighter. With that said, we had 40 cabins participating and it was a LOT of work and took several hours to complete. With our smaller group, I think it would be a lot of fun (it really was a way to share some DIS love). On our 7 nighter, we also did a DIS PJ breakfast, which was a ton of fun too. Some of us more die-hard folks also participated in a Secret Mickey exchange (think Secret Santa). It really was a unique cruise experience running into DISers at every turn - it felt like we had friends everywhere!

I agree with you, Crystal. I've never participated on any of our cruises before, just because I thought it would be too overwhelming to add that to the list of everything else I had to do before we set sail. But, like you said, I think this would be a great group to try it with since it's smaller. I've already been looking at the FE's on e-Bay this morning, so I hope that we can get something going. I would volunteer to organize it, but other than knowing what it is, I have no idea how it works as far as putting it together. I really hope we can do one!
And the PJ breakfast sounds like it was a lot of fun too!!

 

[verygfy]

I am so excited, I can't wait for our cruise. Time is flying by so fast I am afraid I won't get everything I want to get done in time!! We finally got our passports right before the 4th, I was so impressed on how fast we got them (less than a month).

I think FE sounds like fun, but I have no idea how to organize it, I would definitely participate. I like the sound of a PJ breakfast. DH and I are not doing Palo, with this being our first cruise I could not think of a night that I would want to skip dinner and the brunch seemed like to much seafood for DH.

Does anyone know when they will assign cabins?

 

[Jey12]

I'm glad to know that you're so excited! I think you will definitely love it!! Since I've never actually participated in a FE exchange, I figured I would post this link that could probably give you more info than if I tried to explain it:
http://www.disboards.com/showpost.php?p=33184281&postcount=2

Thanks for the great link! I think it sounds like fun to try and do FE's. So do you make them for every night of the cruise, and do we share our room numbers? Not that exploring the ship to find FE's to leave gifts in wouldn't be fun, but might be a little time consuming? Since I've never been on a ship before I don't know how long that would take.

I thought I'd read they normally assign cabins around 45 days prior, is this right? I can't wait to see what our room number is, not sure why that's so exciting but it is.

 

[Crystal_27]

I would be happy to organize the FE exchange. All we will need is to get together a list of those who wish to participate with cabin number. As to how long it takes, when we had 40 cabins participating, it took us about 2.5 hours to get our stuff distributed (we did it the first night). The key is to create the list by floor so you aren't treking up and down flights of stairs unncessarily. And, for those who are still looking to purchase their FEs, we bought ours from "Gradysmommy" on Ebay and she did an incredible, incredible job! She is a bit more pricey than others, but well worth the expense - - her work is flawless.

For those doing the Palo Brunch, have you guys thought any more about securing one of the private dining rooms for a DIS Palo Brunch? And, verygfy, regarding the Palo Brunch being too much seafood, while there are seafood offerings, there are also many many other choices. I don't care for seafood at all, and I was in heaven with the Brunch (they have flatbreads that are outta this world!).

 

[UGAFan0829]

Crystal, are you sure that you don't mind being the organizer?

As far as Palo, I am definitely up for a group thing if everyone else is as well!!

 

[Crystal_27]

Crystal, are you sure that you don't mind being the organizer?

As far as Palo, I am definitely up for a group thing if everyone else is as well!!

No, I don't mind at all - - I can make lists with the best of 'em.

 

[UGAFan0829]

Well, then!! Add me to the list...though I have no idea what our stateroom number will be as we are GTY status!

 

[bellaprincess98]

I would be happy to organize the FE exchange. All we will need is to get together a list of those who wish to participate with cabin number. As to how long it takes, when we had 40 cabins participating, it took us about 2.5 hours to get our stuff distributed (we did it the first night). The key is to create the list by floor so you aren't treking up and down flights of stairs unncessarily. And, for those who are still looking to purchase their FEs, we bought ours from "Gradysmommy" on Ebay and she did an incredible, incredible job! She is a bit more pricey than others, but well worth the expense - - her work is flawless.

For those doing the Palo Brunch, have you guys thought any more about securing one of the private dining rooms for a DIS Palo Brunch? And, verygfy, regarding the Palo Brunch being too much seafood, while there are seafood offerings, there are also many many other choices. I don't care for seafood at all, and I was in heaven with the Brunch (they have flatbreads that are outta this world!).

Hey Crystal, You know I'm definetly down for a Palo group brunch! This may be the only way I'll get in!

 

[Crystal_27]

**ALERT**

I just went to the cruise page and there are Palo Brunches and HIGH TEAs available for our cruise. Hurry!

I didn't realize that the High Teas were offered on the 4 nighters. Another event that was amazing!

 

[Crystal_27]

Fish Extender Participants:

Crystal_27 - Crystal, Randy (DH), DD(6) - 6083
UGAFan0829 - GTY

 

[UGAFan0829]

Hey, stupid question, but what exactly is High Tea? LOL!

By the way--since I've never done the FE before, I'm sure I'll have a ton of questions between now and then! Are we doing this for each person in the room. For example-in your case, I would need to get enough stuff for you, your DH, and The Big, right??

Oh yeah...in our room, it's just me (Missy), and DH (Mike).

THANK YOU for putting this together for us! You rock!!

 

[Crystal_27]

Hey, stupid question, but what exactly is High Tea? LOL!

By the way--since I've never done the FE before, I'm sure I'll have a ton of questions between now and then! Are we doing this for each person in the room. For example-in your case, I would need to get enough stuff for you, your DH, and The Big, right??

Oh yeah...in our room, it's just me (Missy), and DH (Mike).

THANK YOU for putting this together for us! You rock!!

First of all, the HIGH TEA is so, so, so much fun! It is just like a traditional English Tea with tea, yummy scones, mini sandwiches, all in Palo style. When we were on the 7 nighter, I did the Tea with some of my DIS girlfriends since DH wasn't too keen on the thought of having tea, so if you guys want to try and get a High Tea group together with just the "girls" I would be game for that. It is *such* a good deal at only $5/person.

As to the FE, it really is up to you how little or how much you do. We got gifts ranging from candy, to pirate attire, to postcards, to puzzles, to items specific to ones state or city; some Disney themed, some not. Some people buy items, some people make them - - there really are no right or wrong gifts.

DH and I (since we are crafy scrapbooking geeks) made homemade scrapbook photo keychains for each FE family (a group gift per stateroom, not per individual). They were awesome but A LOT of work. I'll see if I can post a picture when I get home.

 

[Crystal_27]

Fish Extender Participants (updated):

Crystal_27 - Crystal, Randy (DH), DD(6) - 6083
UGAFan0829 - Missy, Mike (DH) - GTY

 

[bellaprincess98]

**ALERT**

I just went to the cruise page and there are Palo Brunches and HIGH TEAs available for our cruise. Hurry!

I didn't realize that the High Teas were offered on the 4 nighters. Another event that was amazing!

There are no brunches! I saw the high tea this morning but no brunches!

 

[JRose48]

My husband and I are booked for the high tea on the day at sea. Really looking forward to it.

 

[Jey12]

High tea sounds great! When would we do that? We would for sure be in on doing the FE gift exchange, it sounds so fun! I need to check with the other family we are traveling with to see if they are interested in it as well. Right now please put us down for our family, Jen, Jason and Jordyn (4). How fun! We're GTY so don't know our room number yet but can't wait to find out!

 

[verygfy]

Please add us to the FE Angela, Mitch, Scott (12) and Haley (4). We are also gty, so cabin number yet.