Time Well Spent!! Fish Extenders and Magnets

[scrappinginontario]

For those new to DCL cruising, you may find yourself excited to join a fish extender exchange and/or decorate your stateroom door with magnets!

Both of these are lots of fun and an exciting part of a Disney cruise! This is just a heads up to give yourself plenty of time to prepare and package. I’ve been surprised over the past couple of weeks how much time preparing for these takes.

I don’t regret any of it but am thankful I started early!

 

[MomOTwins]

For those new to DCL cruising, you may find yourself excited to join a fish extender exchange and/or decorate your stateroom door with magnets!

Both of these are lots of fun and an exciting part of a Disney cruise! This is just a heads up to give yourself plenty of time to prepare and package. I’ve been surprised over the past couple of weeks how much time preparing for these takes.

I don’t regret any of it but am thankful I started early!

I totally agree! We did painted rocks and had so much fun. Will add them with a DCL tote bag and coaster for our FE gift. I see a lot of people complain that FE has become a money spending competition but we’ve never felt like that—the homemade one are my favorite.

 

[Flcruising]

I totally agree! We did painted rocks and had so much fun. Will add them with a DCL tote bag and coaster for our FE gift. I see a lot of people complain that FE has become a money spending competition but we’ve never felt like that—the homemade one are my favorite.

You are right about the money competition and then there's the critical posts that follow because someone didn't like what they recieved. No never thought that was fun or nice. Dont want to be involved with them. But. If I were to join an fe group I would love your painted rocks.

 

[ladyofthetramp]

Me too! the rocks are beautiful!

 

[MomOTwins]

You are right about the money competition and then there's the critical posts that follow because someone didn't like what they recieved. No never thought that was fun or nice. Dont want to be involved with them. But. If I were to join an fe group I would love your painted rocks.

Me too! the rocks are beautiful!

Thanks!!!!

 

[wendlle]

OMG my kids would LOVE those rocks!
I can't stand the snottiness of some people complaining they got "dollar store crap"
That's all some people can afford and not everyone is crafty.
This is supposed to be fun, not a competition or a negative activity.

 

[Snowwhyt]

Just got off yesterday in New Orleans and found the hallways looking a little bit shabbier then normal. I don’t think it’s out of line to ask people to make/buy a FE holder. Disney puts effort to make the ship nice. Hanging a dollar store recycling bag off the Fish is tacky. I have and will always be okay with 1or 2 from people who forgot or didn’t arrive on time. I feel bad for them. But there were not that many problems I’m sure of that. It was just plain laziness.
I sailed 3x in a year so my expectations are not out of line. Fantasy 2/2022-nice, Magic 5/2022-amazing, Magic 2/2023-what the heck?

 

[Flcruising]

Just got off yesterday in New Orleans and found the hallways looking a little bit shabbier then normal. I don’t think it’s out of line to ask people to make/buy a FE holder. Disney puts effort to make the ship nice. Hanging a dollar store recycling bag off the Fish is tacky. I have and will always be okay with 1or 2 from people who forgot or didn’t arrive on time. I feel bad for them. But there were not that many problems I’m sure of that. It was just plain laziness.
I sailed 3x in a year so my expectations are not out of line. Fantasy 2/2022-nice, Magic 5/2022-amazing, Magic 2/2023-what the heck?

Yes this is an example of what I'm talking about.

 

[CampbellzSoup]

Did you end up sitting with strangers at diner?

 

[scrappinginontario]

Did you end up sitting with strangers at diner?

Guessing you might be asking me?

We had late seating and a table for 4 for the 2 of us. It was wonderful to have time together yet we also got to know many of the tables around us very well too. The best of both worlds!!

Our servers had 5 tables of 2 at the late seating so all of us were granted our request to dine on our own.

It might be different for those who ask to dine alone at early seating as it's normally full but at late dining time it wasn't a problem at all.

On a side note, we had always requested early dining but this time were assigned late and LOVED it! Our entire sailing felt more relaxed with late dining. We won't go back to early unless we travel with others who 'need' early dining.

 

[CampbellzSoup]

Guessing you might be asking me?

We had late seating and a table for 4 for the 2 of us. It was wonderful to have time together yet we also got to know many of the tables around us very well too. The best of both worlds!!

Our servers had 5 tables of 2 at the late seating so all of us were granted our request to dine on our own.

It might be different for those who ask to dine alone at early seating as it's normally full but at late dining time it wasn't a problem at all.

On a side note, we had always requested early dining but this time were assigned late and LOVED it! Our entire sailing felt more relaxed with late dining. We won't go back to early unless we travel with others who 'need' early dining.

I remember you were contemplating about sitting with others I"m glad it worked out! My son is two and loves to stay up, but we have later days up too then - second seating is the best.

 

[Snowwhyt]

Yes this is an example of what I'm talking about.

To be honest, I had sailed in May on the exact same ship, and it did not look like that at all it was the transatlantic and people seem to care more. We didn’t have tons of last minute adds and I think that made the difference. Perhaps the future does look as disheveled as the cruise I just went on. But I think part of it is the laid-back culture of the ports home city, called the Big Easy. I’ll be going on the dream in December and I expect since will be leaving from Fort Lauderdale. That won’t be as big of an issue.

Did you end up sitting with strangers at diner?

I can tell you from the cruise I got off Friday that it seemed most tables had four people at them. It seemed like everyone was only sitting with family. The bigger tables had kids on one side adults on the other and you can tell it was all just a single family.

 

[yorkieteacher]

I didn’t want to have fish extenders for us two senior cruisers, but I picked up lots of Disney merch at Dollar Tree today to pixie dust one afternoon to pixie dust on our upcoming ing cruise. I’ll be looking for cute extenders that obviously belong to the younger kids to drop things into. I guess this is allowed? On previous cruises we just surprised our grands with little things in their extenders we said we’re from Captain Mickey.

 

[yorkieteacher]

I didn’t want to have fish extenders for us two senior cruisers, but I picked up lots of Disney merch at Dollar Tree today to pixie dust one afternoon to pixie dust on our upcoming ing cruise. I’ll be looking for cute extenders that obviously belong to the younger kids to drop things into. I guess this is allowed? On previous cruises we just surprised our grands with little things in their extenders we said we’re from Captain Mickey.

 

[dcassetta]

I didn’t want to have fish extenders for us two senior cruisers, but I picked up lots of Disney merch at Dollar Tree today to pixie dust one afternoon to pixie dust on our upcoming ing cruise. I’ll be looking for cute extenders that obviously belong to the younger kids to drop things into. I guess this is allowed? On previous cruises we just surprised our grands with little things in their extenders we said we’re from Captain Mickey.

Of course you can do this. It is very nice of you.

 

[scrappinginontario]

I didn’t want to have fish extenders for us two senior cruisers, but I picked up lots of Disney merch at Dollar Tree today to pixie dust one afternoon to pixie dust on our upcoming ing cruise. I’ll be looking for cute extenders that obviously belong to the younger kids to drop things into. I guess this is allowed? On previous cruises we just surprised our grands with little things in their extenders we said we’re from Captain Mickey.

Yes, you are most welcome to Pixie Dust other cabins. We participated in a small FE exchange (loved that each group was only 5 families!) plus shared Pixie Dust also.

 

[gisele2]

Hi, will be one my first Disney cruise next June. I am hesitating to join a fish extender group. I do not want it to be a bad experience.
what are your experiences?

 

[scrappinginontario]

Hi, will be one my first Disney cruise next June. I am hesitating to join a fish extender group. I do not want it to be a bad experience.
what are your experiences?

To me, it's based on my expectations. I go in to it with, 'It's better to give than to receive' attitude. I enjoy the time making the gifts I want to give and choose things I think the majority of people would enjoy receiving.

We were happy with what we received. Some we used right away (a great bag with a cruise logo and our name on it) and others are little trinkets we will share with younger children.

I go in with zero expectations of what I'll receive in return and have enjoyed our experiences.

I will say, this past cruise when the coordinator chose to make small groups of only 5 cabins per group worked wonderfully!! People put the time into choosing meaningful gifts for the few staterooms they were giving to rather than mass producing something 'meh'. The challenge with that though is it's all up to the person coordinating your group.

5 cabins was also nice in that it didn't take too many hours to give out our gifts. We took about an hour after supper the first night of our sailing to pixie dust some magnets and an hour the second day to share our FE gifts.

 

[Flcruising]

Hi, will be one my first Disney cruise next June. I am hesitating to join a fish extender group. I do not want it to be a bad experience.
what are your experiences?

Hi, will be one my first Disney cruise next June. I am hesitating to join a fish extender group. I do not want it to be a bad experience.
what are your experiences?

If the group is very clear about what gifts are acceptable and what isnt I guess it should be fine.
I've never joined an fe group because so many people are critical about what they receive and judgemental towards others in the group. Then they come on the boards and post their comments. I just haven't wanted to deal with those people.
We have created our own family group and had surprises for the kids each day. Told them it was from Mickey.

 

[Lizgistix]

Geez, and I bought my FE on Amazon. it's plain and kind of generic but it was also only $14.99