The Seas are full of WONDER and waves! Our first Disney Cruise - 7-night Eastern Caribbean; Feb 2018

What a fun meet! Did you pre-buy the photo package? We are thinking about it this time around with 5 of us, but never have in the past.

And yes- would love to hear about your Viking cruise!
 
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Such great pics of your adorable little princesses!

Also, I'm definitely interested to hear how Viking compared to DCL.
 
Welcome back! Glad it was a good trip, would love to hear about it!

The napking folding activity sounds different!

Great pics of the girls with the princesses!
 


Part 12) Fancy Napkins and a Gathering of Princesses

Hi everyone - we are back from Italy! It was a bit of a whirlwind of a trip but we had a blast! Got to spend a lot of time with the DIS team as well (apparently in the evenings at one of the lounges that our group basically took over each night)

I have been debating whether or not to do a trip report for the Italy trip - and what I am thinking of is inserting an update or two into this trip report as a bit of an intermission ... I figure part of it would be comparing/contrasting to Disney Cruise Line anyway

Let me know if you would be interested in that and then I can get started on that!

Oh, and I found one video I missed from the girls post-BBB photo shoot so thought I would throw another gif in here .... pretty accurately shows the two personalities: Olivia trying to take it serious but also a bit over it and Emma .... just being Emma

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After the photo shoot we had a bit of time until our next planned event. Consulting the navigator, Olivia expressed interest in the Napkin Folding session - where they would teach us how to fold the napkins all fancy like, and as they do for them in the restaurants - so I took her to that (my mom would join us later as well)

They handed out instruction sheets we could take with us along with a napkin to everyone
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Brian was the instructor and was as entertaining as ever. We did ok with all of them - I think Olivia's Bird of Paradise came out quite well! The Peter Pan's boot (which is guess is their signature one) was rather challenging, but the others we did ok with!
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After it was approaching time for our next activity - which was the princess gathering in the atrium (I had been able to get tickets for this to coincide with their BBB makeovers). Oh, and for the record, Peter wanted nothing to do with any of this so he was in the kids club the entire time :thumbsup2

We were a bit early so had to wait until it was our time slot to get in line, but then we were near the front of the line for our group.

First thing I noticed was there was a Cast Member playing piano in the atrium and he was very good. I later found out his name is Josh and he is the first autistic performer they have hired - and he was just great and did everything from memory, no sheet music.
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This shot shows the entire atrium which is where the princess gathering (as they call it, vs a meet & greet) was located
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First up was Ariel - and I guess princesses need to check out each other's shoes:
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This is one time I was glad for photopass photographers as I was able to focus on taking video and they took the still shots - including getting some twirling
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Next was Cinderella:
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Then Tiana:
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And finally Belle. Emma was very excited to tell that Olivia was dressed to match her. Belle got down lower to Emma's level and Emma then had trouble reaching her for her hug so she kinda fell into her dress (as you can see in the gif)
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Overall I think this was a big success. The girls really liked BBB - It was interesting to see how the two girls reacted to it - I think Olivia is maybe getting to the upper age for it, at least for her/her personality as I think she is wanting to take it more serious and "grown up" - whereas Emma just had fun with it

Coming up - a little lunch and then more photos and formal night dinner .... but also a bit of a rough evening for us!

TTFN

Josh was so great! We did a Disney Music Trivia where you had to guess the song name and movie and he played the songs live on piano. Was really quite something. Apparently they only do this in the promenade lounge. Highly recommend it.
 
I think that sounds like a good idea!

OMG-adorable!

Thanks for your thoughts! I did love that gif (really captures the girls personalities)


What a fun meet! Did you pre-buy the photo package? We are thinking about it this time around with 5 of us, but never have in the past.

And yes- would love to hear about your Viking cruise!

We did pre-buy the photo package (all pictures on USB package) - figured we could always get our money back if we never really used it. In the end we didn't get a ton of pictures but of the ones we did I think we got a number of good ones so I think it was worth it (but probably borderline as not cheap)

Thanks for the input!


Such great pics of your adorable little princesses!

Also, I'm definitely interested to hear how Viking compared to DCL.

Thank you so much - definitely was glad to get the pictures we did and it worked out with the timing of the BBB and then princess meet

Thanks! Will do!
 
Agree with pp's; I'd love to hear comparisons.

Thanks for the input - I think I will go ahead with it!


Welcome back! Glad it was a good trip, would love to hear about it!

The napking folding activity sounds different!

Great pics of the girls with the princesses!

Thank you - definitely was a fun and unique trip - so glad we did it!

They had a lot of activities like that (also towel folding and things) - just fun little things that everyone could participate in

Thank you!



Josh was so great! We did a Disney Music Trivia where you had to guess the song name and movie and he played the songs live on piano. Was really quite something. Apparently they only do this in the promenade lounge. Highly recommend it.

Oh, I didn't realize Josh did the "name the song" - that must have been so fun! Next time ;)
 


Part 13) Lunch and Dinner (part 1)

After the Princess Gathering we went up to grab a bit of food as we hadn't had lunch yet (the only times I could get tickets for the character meets was during the noon hour). We went to the pool deck and got a chicken swarma for Judi and a burger for me and I think we just went to Cabanas for some other food for the girls (honestly, don't have pictures so I am not recalling right now). Overall it was fine - served the purpose needed and nice they have options like this.
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We just took it easy for the rest of the afternoon - but before too long we had to get Peter out of the kids club and get ready for dinner as it was formal night so had to wrestle him into a decent shirt and then go get at least some family pictures as they were set up in the atrium. On the way I wanted to make sure to get a picture of the girls against the Ariel mural they had near the elevator bank that was near our room
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We then headed down to the atrium to get the formal pictures. While on line for the nice pictures I captured some of the kids in a porthole that was there ... some came out nice, some not so much
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When it was our turn for family photos - Emma was not having anything to do with it - so here is what we would have looked like as a family if Emma wasn't born ;) ... and then a photo of just Judi and I together
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Then it was time for dinner - and it was at a location I was really looking forward to: Tiana's Place!


Unfortunately this would not be our best night ... not because of the restaurant or anything Disney did or didn't do - it was that the movement of the ship was getting to some of us. I believe I mentioned before that we had some rough seas (speaking with some other guests who had been on multiple cruises, they indicated this was the worst they had ever experienced), and with the restaurant being in the end of the ship we were really feeling the movement during dinner - especially Judi. Combined with the kids were wanting to get back to the kids clubs and it just wasn't our finest moment


I did my best to take what photos I could and give a feel for the restaurant - but probably not my best dining review ever. First, the menu
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Shortly after we sat down Tiana and Louis came around
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For appetizers, Judi got the duck and pistachio terrine and I think she also got the green and white asparagus, while I got the hot crab dip. We enjoyed all of it but the dip especially was really tasty! (sorry the photos are a bit blurry)
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Olivia and Emma got the Mac n Cheese and Peter got a burger. One thing to note is that the plates here were really cute - you may have noticed the frog on the edge in the places above and there was one right in the middle of the kids plates - really carried the theme and made it feel special and unique!
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I also got the sausage and lentil soup - which was sort of like a gumbo and pretty darn good
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Coming up next - the rest of dinner and some evening activities and challenges!
 
Part 14) Dinner (part 2) and Evening Activities

One thing unique to their restaurant is they have a live band playing during dinner - and they were pretty good and kept things lively and interesting without being too loud and just taking over or anything
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Since Judi wasn't feeling well and we knew we needed to not order wine 2 nights since we got the 5 bottle package we opted to not get wine this night - so I got a beer instead, which was the Abita Purple Haze - figured it was appropriate to get beer from a brewery that is in/near New Orleans. While not the most special beer it is one I will often get as it is tasty and light
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For my entree I ordered the New York Strip at the recommendation of our server and it was a pretty darn good steak - happy with my choice (even if not the most "New Orleansish" dish) ..... aaaaand apparently I didn't get pictures of anyone else's entree
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I think at this point Judi was really feeling it and didn't even order an entree and shortly later left. She took Emma to the kids club as Emma was really bouncing off the walls a bit and wouldn't eat, etc. and just wanted to go there, and then Judi went back to the room to rest and try to not be sick. Not long after I took Peter and Olivia to the kids club as of course they wanted to get to go if Emma got to go.

After all that I did order dessert and I had heard really good things about their desserts so I ordered a few (partly thinking maybe Judi would come back and want to try some but partly because I just wanted to try them)
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So I got the Louisina Root Beer Creme (which was different and I appreciate them trying something different - not sure if I would want it all the time but fun to try), the Tiana's Place Sundae (which was quite good - I found I got the sundaes a lot and they were all really good - sometimes a good sundae is a great meal capper), and also the signature dessert which was the Banofee Cream Pie (which I also enjoyed - though, again, not something I would want all the time).
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Our server came by and asked about where Olivia was - as they were going to sing Happy Birthday to her, but I informed him she went to the kids club, so they would wait until the next night.

After dinner I went back to the room to check on Judi - she still wasn't feeling great. I did get a picture of the towel animal we got for this night:
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She was just going to stay in so I figured I would go out a bit on my own and saw in the Navigator Guide that Josh was playing in the Cadillac Lounge, so I went there to watch him - he was doing Broadway Showtunes and it was a lot of fun
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I also used this time to get online just to check on things and found an article I had submitted to the DIS had been published ("5 ways for Disney to Address the High Crowds at Disney Parks" - cheap plug ;)), so that was fun to see and saw there was quite a bit of discussion about it, so fun to check that out as well
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I also enjoyed a beer while there - the Kona Pale Ale, which is solid
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I stayed a bit longer after Josh finished his set to finish my beer and then went to go get Emma as time for at least her to go to bed. By the time I had gotten to the Atrium he was playing there again and one of the guests was singing with him (I heard she's done this before and doesn't work for Disney or anything but has a good voice and they enjoy performing together .... they were doing Love is an Open Door at this point):
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I picked Emma up and when we got back to the room we found some Fish Extender gifts had been delivered, so Emma was glad to get hers!
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One thing that also was happening this night is we were passing into a new time zone so all the clocks needed to be set ahead an hour. Our room stewards had done this when they did the turn down service and I think it threw my mom off as the clocks said it was an hour later than it really was - so she thought the kids were out super late when it wasn't really that late. We eventually clarified things in the morning but we got into a little bit of an argument at the time (I think everyone was just a bit off that night - but that was it and the rest of the trip everything went great!)

And that is it for Day 2 of the cruise! Coming up next, Day 3 (shocker) and we start off with a character breakfast!

TTFN!
 
Looks like a nice night despite the rough seas. I have never been on a cruise so I don't know what that is like. The meal at Tiana's looks really nice. Emma looks really excited about that gift!
 
Fantastic update. I'm sorry about the rough seas. I am not a good sailor and it's something I worry about every time we cruise (even though I use the patch). And congratulations on getting your article published! It's really good! I had one published last month, too, and it really made my day, so I can imagine how great it was to see that on your cruise! Looking forward to more updates. :goodvibes
 
Despite the rough waters it still looked like a fun night. I understand what Judi was feeling that night because I got a little nauseous one night on a Norwegian Cruise because of rough waters. The appetizers and your steak looked really good at Tiana’s. I heard a lot of great things about tiana’s place. Emma also looked really excited about her gift.
 
We went to the pool deck and got a chicken swarma for Judi and a burger for me and I think we just went to Cabanas for some other food for the girls (honestly, don't have pictures so I am not recalling right now). Overall it was fine - served the purpose needed and nice they have options like this.

Yay for Shwarma on the Wonder! You're right, it's not like the best shwarma but considering it's on a cruise with limited options it's definitely nice to have and pretty tasty!

For appetizers, Judi got the duck and pistachio terrine and I think she also got the green and white asparagus, while I got the hot crab dip.

Ooh the hot crab dip sounds good! I am allergic to most crab but I love the flavor of crab dip. :sad:

Olivia and Emma got the Mac n Cheese and Peter got a burger. One thing to note is that the plates here were really cute - you may have noticed the frog on the edge in the places above and there was one right in the middle of the kids plates - really carried the theme and made it feel special and unique!

I love the themed plates! I may have gotten myself the kids plate while in Cabanas for breakfast...just so cute!

So I got the Louisina Root Beer Creme (which was different and I appreciate them trying something different - not sure if I would want it all the time but fun to try)

What exactly is a Root Beer Creme? It looks like some sort of fudge or flan type thing.

After dinner I went back to the room to check on Judi - she still wasn't feeling great. I did get a picture of the towel animal we got for this night:
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So cute!!

I picked Emma up and when we got back to the room we found some Fish Extender gifts had been delivered, so Emma was glad to get hers!
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Aww she looks so happy! Adorable!
 
I’m laughing at the “this is what our family would have looked like if we didn’t have Emma” comment. I could so see that being one of our kids too.

Tianas place looks fun! I love Purple Haze. I don’t drink a lot of beer anymore, but it’s refreshing and tasty.

Sorry seas were rough, but looks like a fun day none-the-less!
 
I enjoyed your review of Tiana's Place, but it sucks that the rough seas made a difference in your family's experience. When I ate there, I remember really enjoying the dip a lot. I also really enjoyed the band. It made me wish that I brought my saxophone on the cruise and played along. :D
 
I'm sorry Emma wasn't into the family photo! They still came out nice though ;)

Stink that this wasn't the best night and you couldn't fully enjoy your meal. That's really cool that Tiana and Louis make an appearance!
 
Looks like a nice night despite the rough seas. I have never been on a cruise so I don't know what that is like. The meal at Tiana's looks really nice. Emma looks really excited about that gift!

definitely tried to make the best of it but it was a bit of a downer how much the seas impacted us - especially Judi that night .... so did detract a bit for us.

We loved Tiana's - so really glad with it being a 7 night cruise we had another chance later in the cruise to experience it again


Fantastic update. I'm sorry about the rough seas. I am not a good sailor and it's something I worry about every time we cruise (even though I use the patch). And congratulations on getting your article published! It's really good! I had one published last month, too, and it really made my day, so I can imagine how great it was to see that on your cruise! Looking forward to more updates. :goodvibes

Thank you! The rocking of the ship was more than we expected and did get to us a bit - we saw a lot of people with patches on (behind their ears) and just a lot of chatter amongst guests as to what they were taking for the seas, etc. We had sea-bands which helped a bit but if we had to do it over again we would have been more proactive with taking medication

Thank you - it is exciting to get an article published and was fun to check while on the cruise (and seemed like a lot of comments on the story, so that was fun to read as well)


Despite the rough waters it still looked like a fun night. I understand what Judi was feeling that night because I got a little nauseous one night on a Norwegian Cruise because of rough waters. The appetizers and your steak looked really good at Tiana’s. I heard a lot of great things about tiana’s place. Emma also looked really excited about her gift.

The waters were just rougher than we were expecting and it made the ship rock way more than we were expecting - is what it is and I will say the 2nd half of the cruise was much calmer and it made a BIG difference

The food in all the restaurants was really good but we definitely enjoyed Tiana's - and were glad we got another meal there later in the week


Yay for Shwarma on the Wonder! You're right, it's not like the best shwarma but considering it's on a cruise with limited options it's definitely nice to have and pretty tasty!

Ooh the hot crab dip sounds good! I am allergic to most crab but I love the flavor of crab dip. :sad:

I love the themed plates! I may have gotten myself the kids plate while in Cabanas for breakfast...just so cute!

What exactly is a Root Beer Creme? It looks like some sort of fudge or flan type thing.

So cute!!

Aww she looks so happy! Adorable!

Agree about the Swarma - and it is something we like in general and just nice to have options at the quick service that isn't just burgers and the like

Oh no! Sorry to hear you are allergice to most crab. The dip was really good and the type of thing I like (something cheesy and tasty to spread on carbs is right up my alley!)

So the root beer creme itself was definitely like a gillee or a flan type thing - so a bit jigly and then the accompanyments were the other flavors you would get in a root beer float. It was good and interesting, but not something I would want all the time. I do appreciate them trying something different though

Emma was definitely excited to get the gift!
 
I’m laughing at the “this is what our family would have looked like if we didn’t have Emma” comment. I could so see that being one of our kids too.

Tianas place looks fun! I love Purple Haze. I don’t drink a lot of beer anymore, but it’s refreshing and tasty.

Sorry seas were rough, but looks like a fun day none-the-less!

it just hit me that the idea was to get nice family pictures and then we didn't get the whole family ... but I definitely learned on this vacation more than any other to just roll with it and if we didn't get everyone in every picture it isn't the end of the world

We really liked Tiana's - even more than I thought we would - and were very glad we still had another meal there coming up (benefits of a 7 night cruise!). I thought the Purple Haze was a fitting beer to get and it is tasty and refreshing, for sure!

The rough seas definitely detracted a bit and had us questioning the whole "cruise thing" - but the 2nd half of the cruise was much calmer and that made a bit difference in our overall experience


I enjoyed your review of Tiana's Place, but it sucks that the rough seas made a difference in your family's experience. When I ate there, I remember really enjoying the dip a lot. I also really enjoyed the band. It made me wish that I brought my saxophone on the cruise and played along. :D

Thanks! Fortunately we had another meal to come at Tiana's and (spoiler alert) it worked out much better for our family! The band is really good - I was worried it would be too much noise and too much distraction, etc. but they weren't playing 100% of the time and it just added to the whole atmosphere


I'm sorry Emma wasn't into the family photo! They still came out nice though ;)

Stink that this wasn't the best night and you couldn't fully enjoy your meal. That's really cool that Tiana and Louis make an appearance!

Thank you! Funny thing is later in the cruise she was the only one who wanted to get photos - so it is what is is and a less to me to just roll with things and not worry about it

It definitely wasn't the best night - but the 2nd half of the cruise was much calmer which helped a lot and we did have another meal to come in Tiana's so that was good to know
 
Part 15) Disney Jr Character Breakfast

After another not great night (the ship was still rocking a bit so didn't get the best night of sleep - wasn't sick or anything, just not used to the motion .... perhaps should have prepared by sleeping on a water bed ::yes::) Day 3 of the cruise dawned.

As Peter and Olivia got back to the room rather late, they got their Fish Extender gifts in the morning rather than last night
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Our first activity for the day was an early one, as we had booked the Disney Jr. Character Breakfast for this morning. It was held in Animator's Palette - and it is pretty neat how they can use the screens to transform at least the feel of the room (we would see that again a bit later for other events) with showing scenes/episodes from various Disney Jr Shows (I recall quite a bit of the Lion Guard being played)

We weren't at our normal table and didn't have our normal servers - so compared to dinner this felt a little unorganized, but was still fun. Here is the menu (nothing super creative - other than fun names for things)
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One thing they do is take the colorful napkins and make funny hats/headwear out of them and just plop them on your heads - the kids thought this was really funny that Mommy and Daddy had funny hats on
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Our food came and it was all pretty solid - I will say now that I was feeling the ship movement a lot this morning so I didn't eat much and probably also why I wasn't into taking pictures of food (I remember I got pancakes). Then the characters started coming around - first Doc McStuffin's who was fun in acting out things with the kids
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Then Jake - who had way more energy than we did at this point in the morning :rotfl:
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And then Sophia came around. We had a bit of an incident at this point as Emma decide mid-meet that she did want to meet Sofia and got out of her chair and ran around to the other side of the table (where Sofia was) and why running, tripped and banged her head pretty good and she was really upset and crying, etc. Sofia was not quite sure how to react but after a while did try to comfort Emma and it definitely helped a bit - but overall made for a bit of a sad meet
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Then Mickey in his tux came around - always great to meet the Big Cheese! (you can see Emma was doing better by now)
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As we were heading out I did notice among the sketches that line the hallway into Animator's Palette this one of what I guess is early concept art for the Inside Out Characters (I thought seeing things like this all around the ship was really cool)
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Coming up next - Coffee and Frozen (not frozen coffee)
 
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Part 16) Coffee and Frozen

We went back to the room to hang out a bit and just rest for a bit. Peter was chilling on the balcony (and kept giving me variations of Thumbs Up and Thumbs Down).
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The kids then decided they wanted to go back to the kids club (surprising, I know).

After dropping the kids off, my mom went to (I think) check out another drawing class while Judi and I went up to the pool deck to try and get some sun and just explore the adults only areas

I went to the Cove Cafe to check that out and wound up ordering one of their specialty coffees (the caramel hazelnut mocha). These are an extra charge but you get a card and after you buy 5 coffees you get another one free. I took pictures of the menu but they all had glare on them, so borrowing this one from Disney's site (by the way, I love how everything is sort of around the same price, except for the random Remy Martin Louis the 13th Cognac which starts at $189 an oz:scared1:
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They would always do a fun design on the top of the coffees. They also had this cool contraption for making iced coffee
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Judi was enjoying being in the sun and resting (but also trying to block the wind a bit, and thus by the class wall)
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Eventually we did decide to move as we had to go get the kids for our next ticketed event - which was meeting the Frozen characters. This was the time the kids really pushed back and didn't want to come and were all grumpy about the whole thing (keep in mind, when we go to Walt Disney World getting to meet Anna and Elsa is a huge priority for them - but this time they wanted nothing to do with it when compared to staying in the kids club). Eventually they agreed though.

Oh, one reason we had gone back to the room was because Emma wanted to change back into her fancy dress - I think she would have worn this for the rest of the cruise if we let her
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The meet was also in the Animator's Palette (we had been there quite a bit so far this cruise) and now it was changed to be like we are in the snowy mountains, approaching Elsa's Ice Palace
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One we got to meet them Peter and Olivia were way more into it. Emma was being really shy for some reason though. Overall it was a good meet (though I heard on some cruises they also had Olaf which would have been fun)
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Coming up - lunch, delivering our Fish Extender gifts, and a beer swap!!!

TTFN!
 

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