ScottW3

24 Days to go!!  
In the midst of my credit card working overtime during my shopping phase, we received some bad news that Kenzie and Jeremy won't be able to join us on this cruise.  We will certainly miss them on this trip, but I'm sure they will join us on a future SC cruise (because we all know this is the first of many)!
We updated Yen so she didn't plan a bunch of things for them.  Taking away some of their activities means more R&R for us.  We're pretty low key (which is to say we're getting old), so a lot less for Yen to do!
During my shopping adventures, I found some fabulous monogrammed items for her, and knowing she is from Malaysia, I had a saying translated into Malay and engraved on some items (in case she's reading this, I don't want to give away what they are).  😊  I'll share pics after we give them to her.
This weekend means luggage is being staged with several items that won't be used between now and then...and making room for all of my incoming packages! 🙄

When you are SC, literally, all you do is eat.  There is an insane amount of food flowing at all times.  We almost always have to tell the Genie to STOP with the food delivery.  It’s beyond decadence. It’s sinful.  

9 days out and starting to gather “stuff” for the trip. Two updates for today:
1.  I noticed yesterday that a new (at least new for me) section was on the Royal app for check in. So this morning I loaded all the vaccination data for Stacy, Taylor Kaitlyn and the old man.  Including photos of the cards. That’s when I noticed that there was no Lot# on my card for the first dose!  Uh oh. I will return to my pharmacy in the morning to have them fix that. They told me on the phone not to worry. We shall see!  
 
2.  Our kids are self-sufficient, confident and as grown up as it gets.  They rarely ask for anything specific. But when they do ask, I try to make it happen. The birthday girl, Taylor, sent me a photo and asked that we recreate it this year.  This photo was taken on the Disney Magic 17 or 18 years ago.  Our amazing Romina has confirmed that Royal no longer rents tuxedos on their ships. So I’m shopping local for a tux. Taylor is shopping for a pink dress. One way or another we’ll recreate the moment. This is what it’s all about!
 

No reprice. Their deposits will just get rolled into what's already been paid for the cruise and credited towards the remaining balance.

They can be removed, yes. Just call or have your TA call.

I don't have an official source but I believe I've seen it posted that the pricing for passenger #3 and higher is locked in once you book with 3+ passengers.  So going from 2 to 3 will trigger a reprice but going from 3 to 4+ does not.  They just add more people at passenger #3's price.  Based on that, I've seen recommendations to book for the most people you think will come because it's always harder to add people.  (For example, even if the room fits more, if the muster station is full, you cannot add more passengers).  If the per passenger cost is locked, it shouldn't be hard to remove them.  Definitely worth calling.
No show is certainly an option but probably an expensive choice due to the suite.

Like @WAAAYTOOO said, your best bet is to call them. That being said, we have 6 in a 2BRATS as well. Passengers 5 and 6 are the same rate as numbers 3 and 4, so if the two youngest are passengers 5 and 6 dropping them off shouldn't cause a reprice. I have booked a few of these rooms with 4 originally, and the base rate never changed when I added guests 5 and 6.
You may lose your deposit for the two, or get it back as FCC depending on the CWC rules for your sailing.

I really don't know the answer for sure, but I think there is a very good chance that the cruisefare would be repriced if you removed pax at this point.
The advice that I think you will receive here is to simply have the 2 young'uns be no-shows at the pier.  Basically, do nothing...but they simply don't come along.  You would be refunded taxes and port fees for them but the cruisefare would not change.
I would discuss this with your TA if you booked through one and there's no down side to calling Royal to ask them if you booked directly.

That's the number I called and was told otherwise previously.  I decided to go ahead and call back today since it had been a while since I called.  The rep I spoke with today confirmed that I was eligible for $125 OBC from my Mlife gold status.  After a very long hold, however, I was told the sailing I wished to apply it to was not eligible as I had booked it through a travel agent.  Since I'm getting $1000 OBC from the travel agent, I'll keep the booking with her.  Oh well.  At least now I know I had been given incorrect info in the past. And hopefully this helps others. 

I think you may have called the wrong number…it’s my understanding if you earned MLife Gold status then you get the credit. If you were given Gold status through Royal Caribbean (most people here) then you don’t.
How do I access my M life Rewards Benefits with Royal Caribbean or Celebrity Cruises?
M life Rewards members must validate their tier status by calling Royal Caribbean at (1-800-762-0702) or Celebrity Cruises at (Platinum & NOIR: 1-888-858-4478; Sapphire, Pearl, & Gold: 1-855-227-2537). Benefits must be requested at the time of the initial booking and at least ten (10) days prior to the cruise’s departure date.

http://www.clubroyaleoffers.com
Use your C&A number.

I am both excited and terrified to begin my first live Blog here of my first ever Star Class sailing and also….our wedding! I can only hope it is HALF as good as the amazing bloggers I read religiously here! 48 DAYS! Here we go!    The Story- My husband and I (I will explain!) booked this cruise for our wedding 2 YEARS ago during a Black Friday sale at an amazing price! We both LOVE cruising…so much so that we have a YouTube channel called BoosCruize so it seemed natural that we would choose to tie the knot in a small ceremony on the high seas! So after much research we decided on the Star Loft Suite 1720 on Oasis Of The Seas! This suite had a HUGE rectangular balcony that could fit guests and also give us the ocean view we wanted….and a Genie to help us pull it all off! What could go wrong?!? Enter…COVID 🤦🏽‍♂️🤦🏽‍♂️ As you can imagine we basically needed a new pair of britches every other day for the last two years as things changed. It’s a good thing I buzz cut my head or I’d probably be bald and NOT by choice LOL     A year later we weren’t even sure if this cruise would happen but we also KNEW we wanted to be married. So when a company came to us and asked to throw us a huge West Coast “David Tutera” style wedding in Hollywood that will be published for magazines we obviously said YES! We now have two bi-coastal weddings Lol It was amazingly gorgeous but nothing was our choice. It was all chosen for us….right down to our tuxes. We feel BEYOND blessed but it also wasn’t what we had in our head two years ago. So now here we are….our guest list of 50 has gone down to 12 due to covid complications. Are we upset? HECK NO! We completely understand and are going to have the time of our LIVES on a gorgeous ship surrounded by people who love us! We can’t wait!    Who: We are an LA couple. Jarell is an international Flight attendant (yaasss benefits!) and I am an actor who just moved from NYC in time for a pandemic to close Hollywood 😂😂   Where: We are sailing on the Oasis Of The Seas out of Miami in the Star Loft Suite 1720 with stops at Coco Cay, St.Thomas, and St. Maarten    When: We sail November 7th-14th, 2021   I think that covers most of the back story and introductions! So happy to meet you all and take you along with us on this very special journey that is over 2 years in the making! Can’t wait to see who our Genie will be!    For good measure I have included a photo of the happy grooms from our West Coast Wedding!     

Final thoughts:
This trip has been absolutely amazing.  It was off to a rough start, but wow, it ended as one of our favorite cruises.  We worried about how cruising would be with all of the new Covid restrictions and if we would walk around with a scarlet letter on our heads bringing kids too young to be vaccinated on a cruise.  We were totally wrong.  Everybody on the ship was very nice and some even smiled, laughed, and played with the kids, especially the youngest two.  We didn't get a single rude comment or look from other passengers about cruising with kids.  The staff seemed so happy to be back at sea and were very accommodating. 
There were obviously things we missed like the Quest, Love and Marriage, World's Sexiest Man Competition,  and the Belly Flop Competition.  We also wish we could have done laser tag and the escape room, but there is so much to do even without those that it was still an amazing trip.  One thing I missed was the interaction that we usually get with our room attendant.  I don't think this was his fault though, as there are so many new rules they must abide by such as not going into the room when the guests are there.  It made the experience less personal with him even though he seemed like a nice guy.  The vaccinated only and everybody shows were also an annoyance at times when the everybody show ended up playing too late for kids.  Hairspray was phenomenal, but Steven commented that the minimal seating detracted from the ambience (there was less people to laugh and clap at key moments in the performance).   We also did not like having the Windjammer closed for dinner, but we were always so full anyway.  We only made one stop at the Windjammer this cruise, and we actually perferred how it is now with them serving you food.  It's nice not to have to worry about people touching all the food with their hands plus the food seemed fresher perhaps due to smaller portions being brought out at a time.  Sunil picked out all of our servers at the specialty restaurants and he did a fantastic job because all of the servers we had were wonderful (with the exception of the guy at Playmakers, but Sunil did not choose him).
We continually saw the Covid restrictions being modified.  Room service went from not being allowed in your room to allowed in if you go into a different room and then finally to closer to what it used to be like all within a one week period.  We watched a limit of five in a pool be modified to no limit.  The genies went from not being able to pick up your kids from Adventure Ocean to being able to.  Initially, we were told they were not doing the 2 for $20 t-shirts sale on this cruise because it puts people in too close of proximity to each other, but on day 6, the t-shirt sale happened.  Cruising is slowly returning to normal, and we watched this transition happen every day.
I would be remiss to end this without taking about Sunil.  If you are lucky enough to get him as your genie, you are in for a treat.  He truly made this trip unique.  He went above and beyond and became like family to us.  The kids are already talking about requesting him as our genie when we go on Symphony in April, which we are definitely going to do.  For anyone wondering, he goes home on November 27th, and then he is going back to Symphony in January. 
Lastly, thank you to everyone who followed along.  I hope this helped show what the current state of cruising is.  Happy cruising and best of luck to everyone!
 
 
 
 

Thank you to all of the fabulous bloggers on here that have helped feed my newly found addiction this past year. I am going to try and give back and hopefully give you something to read while waiting on your next cruise!
 
The who – Myself, DH, 3 daughters (22, 14, 6), and then DD22 and DD14 are both bringing a friend
The what – Our week full of firsts. This will be our first time: in a suite, sailing star class, trying a specialty restaurant, letting the older kids bring a friend (what were we thinking 🤪), trying out the Beach Club, sailing on an Oasis class ship, visiting Costa Maya, sailing out of Port Canaveral and my first ever blog! Those are just the easy ones I can think of off the top of my head.
The when: Sailing October 10 - October 17. DH will drive down Oct 8 by himself (he doesn’t like to fly). Myself, DD14, her friend and DD6 will fly down the evening of Oct 8. DD22 and her friend are flying down Oct 9.
The where: Our itinerary is ORLANDO (PORT CANAVERAL), FL ; COZUMEL, MEXICO ; PUERTO COSTA MAYA, MEXICO ; NASSAU, BAHAMAS ; PERFECT DAY AT COCOCAY
The why: Do we seriously need a reason??? We booked this one sometime mid last year and it has since evolved into a college graduation cruise for the oldest.
The how: As I said above, this sailing was booked sometime last year. I was upset a huge milestone birthday cruise for myself was cancelled. I was reading all of the live blogs about star class and I thought it would be something I could only dream about. Then one day one of the fabulous posters here mentioned a great price on this sailing. I looked it up, price was doable, it just so happened to be fall break according to our school district’s future draft calendar so kids wouldn’t miss school. It's like it was meant to be! I emailed the fabulous @michelleand the rest is history.
 
Countdown: 20 days until flight ; 22 days until boarding 

Then after we wrapped up dinner Chef Roy came out with his cell phone with his wife Marilyn on FaceTime. After I took the phone away from her ear and showed her it was a video call she was excited to get to say hello to her old crew friend again.
Room service delivered the leftover cake to our room about 5 minutes after we got back to the cabin. Room service came back a few minutes later after that- this time with the cake wrapped in plastic.

We had sent Alan our breakfast delivery order for this morning. They call the room before bringing the food up. This time they rolled the cart into the room and asked if we wanted it on our inside table or on the balcony.

Somehow this is the bloody mary that @CGTLH ordered. It has somehow reproduced in transit.

All one can of it.
Thanks Crown and Anchor Society!

Misread the title of this post as "OBC from simply having midlife crisis".
 

You will be able to watch the aquatheater shows from your balcony and they have rehersals during the day, so that's very fun to watch.  
AO got revamped on Oasis and it's actually a much newer concept than on Harmony.  @Matt has blogged about it in several places and he was hesitant at first but he loves the new AO.  During the revamp they redid the entire AO area and there's a lot more interactive technology involved.  The area is more open and the kids have more choice in what they participate in.  It's not like before where if they didn't want to participate in the activity that was happening they didn't have much else to do.
More and more I read your responses, I definitely think Oasis would be the better choice for you guys.

If you want a 2BR, I wouldn't hesitate to hurry and book, even in today's climate.

I agree with @AshleyDillo.  Given the fact that your Oasis choice is on the lower deck, I would definitely go with Oasis.  In the case of the ATS, lower is very important....the lower suites themselves and the balconies are much bigger.  That, and the fact that Oasis has already been amped. The ATS are such awesome suites.  Everyone is going to love, love, love the view and the amenities.  I would not let the shows nor the decor influence my decision....there is so much more to consider.  The $$ is certainly something to consider...but by the time you have spent THAT much money on a suite, $700 isn't really a deal-breaker, IMO.  It's true that Oasis does not have Wonderland, but that's a ++ for me as I am not a fan....but for some, it is disappointing not to get to try Wonderland.   Don't know how adventurous the kids are but most kids find Wonderland waaaytooo long and the food is not kid-friendly (nor adult-friendly in our case !!) unless your kids are atypical with food.  The decor in Wonderland is fun though.  

Oasis has the biggest Splashaway Bay to date on a Royal ship if that's a big deal for the kids.
However it's kind of a tie for me between Harmony and Oasis.  The lower deck ATS is larger, but Harmony's decor just feels more modern.
I loved the ATS show on Oasis but not a fan of CATS.  I found Grease on Harmony much more enjoyable.
The food is a toss up too!  On Oasis you have Portside BBQ, Giovannis, Playmakers and El Loco Fresh.  Then Harmony has Wonderland, Jamie's and Sabor.
Man..isn't it great Royal still has so much variety within the same class ship?!?  Unless you are trying to make this decision, of course.