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Thanking my lucky STARS that cruising is back (a Symphony Star Class family blog)


Tiffeven

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11 cruises canceled, 4 devastated kids, 2 very sad adults, way too much future cruise credit.... 

8 cruises scheduled, 4 excited kids, 2 very happy, yet leery adults, only 34 days to go until Star Class on Symphony!!!!

Wow!  Cruising is back!!!  I am so excited that we can finally say that.  I was one of those people saying "surely, cruising will have started back by ...," but as one cruise after the next was canceled, I started to wonder if we would ever return to sea.  I went from reading daily live blogs and watching youtube cruise vlogs all the time to rarely doing it.  My closet of vacation attire went from a "cruise closet" to a "Club Med closet."  Then, I saw that a ship was set to sail and then another, and the next thing you know I began to think, "Wow, this might actually happen!"  Initially, I was worried about what it would be like sailing since my kids are too young to be vaccinated (even though my husband and I are fully vaccinated).  I worried about us being treated like second class citizens, and most of all I worried about how this would make the kids feel.  Some of you, can even attest to my facebook post where I voiced my concerns about this.  After, contemplating this for awhile, my husband and I decided to talk to our two older kids about this, and they still wanted to go.  At that point, we said "This is OUR cruise, and we are going to go and enjoy ourselves and not let anyone ruin that for us!  As this initial fear subsided, the excitement finally began to fully kick in.  Cruise Vlogs and Blogs are back on the menu, and we even bought a new cruise wardrobe for the kids, but before I get too much further into this blog, I should probably stop and introduce my family and tell you a little about us and our booking.

Family: Tiffany, Steven (he will be co-blogging with me), Christian/CJ (11 year old boy), Sophia (9 year old girl), Nyssa/Prissy (3 year old girl), and Katarina/Kat/Kitty (2 year old girl)

Ship: Symphony of the Seas

Sail Date: September 11, 2021-September 18, 2021

Cabin Type: 2 Bedroom Aquatheater Suite 

Itinerary: Miami, Florida; Philipsburg, St. Maarten; Charlotte Amalie, ST. Thomas; Perfect Day at CocoCay; Miami, Florida

I look forward to catching up with those who have followed my other blogs and also getting to know some new faces.  We have cruised star class before, so I will try to cover any changes since cruising has returned.  I will also let you know what it is like sailing with kids too young to be vaccinated.

 

 

 

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This cruise is a lift and shift from an Oasis of the Seas August 2020 cruise.  We got a fantastic price since it was booked within a few months of the sail date.  I'm pretty sure, Royal knew it wouldn't happen, but we were hoping for the best and figured worse case scenario, it would make a great lift and shift if the cruise didn't happen.  Obviously, Oasis didn't happen but our price was protected and we were excited to switch from the New Jersey Oasis itinerary to the Symphony Eastern Caribbean itinerary from Florida especially since we are due to be on Oasis again in November.  We were also able to snag a price I couldn't believe on a Thrill Waterpark Cabana and Full Day Pass during the shutdown.  I had never seen it listed for $399 nor have I since.

At 90 days pre-cruise, we logged in to do our online check-in.   Unfortunately,  it was not available until about 60 days out.  We also never received our Star Class survey, but after calling Royal, they advised me they never were given my email by our TA.  They quickly resolved this and we received our survey within a few hours.  It is pretty much the same as before, but one of the questions was worded differently to keep up with the times (it used Elon Musk as part of the question).  After seeing who the genies were on Symphony, we requested Sunil.  I'm sure we would be happy with any of the genies, but we have heard so much good about Sunil we couldn't resist (especially since Alan is not there and is on the Allure instead).  I am interested to see if we end up with Sunil, and I will update you all as soon as I receive my genie email.

 

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Looking forward to following this, even if Star Class is something I'll likely never be able to afford to book. It's still fun seeing just how much it comes with and how much the genies work to make the trip a cut above.

Question -- You're Tiffany and he's Steven, and your handle here is Tiffeven. So should I be looking out for co-blogger posts from Stevany? ? ?

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58 minutes ago, JLMoran said:

Looking forward to following this, even if Star Class is something I'll likely never be able to afford to book. It's still fun seeing just how much it comes with and how much the genies work to make the trip a cut above.

Question -- You're Tiffany and he's Steven, and your handle here is Tiffeven. So should I be looking out for co-blogger posts from Stevany? ? ?

Hey, you never know what could happen in the future.  Not to mention, Star or not, a cruise is a cruise, and we have all went way too long without. 

We went with Tiffeven because we used the name Tiffeven and Stiffany in a video game we play together, and after Steven started getting called Stiffy, we decided Tiffeven was a little more PG haha.

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1 hour ago, wannabecruiseexpert said:

So excited to be following along! We will be on our first SC sailing in October, with 1 unvaccinated child that is too young so I am anxious to see how everything goes. 

Glad to have you following along.  I'm sure you will have a blast.  As we all say, it's hard to go back once you've went Star Class.  Hopefully, our trip will ease any worries you have and answer any questions you have about sailing with a little one too young to be vaccinated.

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33 minutes ago, Tiffeven said:

Glad to have you following along.  When is your next trip?  I always love reading your blogs.

Thank you.  I enjoy the blogs. 

Well....our next bookings are B3B on Mariner (9-13, 17, 20) but I am certain that we will have to cancel all 3 of those as I fear the vax protocols will preclude us from going to the casino, which is a show-stopper for us.  Next up would be 10-3 on Allure, but that one goes to St. Thomas so we won't be able to go on that one.  Then 10-10 on Allure...which we will take providing they allow us into the casino.  Our next Star Class will be on 11-21 on Allure.  This is a B2B but since the preceding cruise goes to St. Thomas, unless they change the rules to allow us to sail, we will not be able to take that one.

So, lots of new cruises being lost but lots of money going back into my pocket, so it's a win-win, lose-lose, I guess !

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1 hour ago, WAAAYTOOO said:

Thank you.  I enjoy the blogs. 

Well....our next bookings are B3B on Mariner (9-13, 17, 20) but I am certain that we will have to cancel all 3 of those as I fear the vax protocols will preclude us from going to the casino, which is a show-stopper for us.  Next up would be 10-3 on Allure, but that one goes to St. Thomas so we won't be able to go on that one.  Then 10-10 on Allure...which we will take providing they allow us into the casino.  Our next Star Class will be on 11-21 on Allure.  This is a B2B but since the preceding cruise goes to St. Thomas, unless they change the rules to allow us to sail, we will not be able to take that one.

So, lots of new cruises being lost but lots of money going back into my pocket, so it's a win-win, lose-lose, I guess !

Oh man.  That's disappointing, but I don't blame you one bit.  Being told you can't go into areas of the ship (particularly ones you love) is a deal breaker.  I really hope they loosen up the rules.  I am so worried our B2B Star Class on Oasis in November will be affected by our kids not being able to be vaccinated.  They told me right now the no B2B for unvaccinated only applies to August sailings, but I really hope that doesn't extend further.  It would be nice to get some normalcy back. 

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30 minutes ago, Tiffeven said:

Oh man.  That's disappointing, but I don't blame you one bit.  Being told you can't go into areas of the ship (particularly ones you love) is a deal breaker.  I really hope they loosen up the rules.  I am so worried our B2B Star Class on Oasis in November will be affected by our kids not being able to be vaccinated.  They told me right now the no B2B for unvaccinated only applies to August sailings, but I really hope that doesn't extend further.  It would be nice to get some normalcy back. 

Frankly, I don't think you really have anything to worry about with the unvaxxed children.  The only possible issue would be getting "up front" seats in the theater, as I think you will be required to remain in the balcony...but the Genie will still be able to reserve you seats so aside from not being able to sit up close, it will still be nice.  Dan is the one who likes to sit up front.  I don't think the seats in the front of the theater are the greatest so I wouldn't be disappointed with that rule at all !!

I had read somewhere (can't remember where) that unvaccinated (including children) weren't allowed in the Aqua Theater, which makes NO sense to me AT ALL.  But that wouldn't affect you anyway b/c you can just watch the show from your balcony !!  I think that must have been a misprint though...why in the world would they keep anyone out of the ATS...it's outside for goodness sake !!

I don't think the kids will be able to ice skate, if that's a problem.  I don't think unvaxxed are permitted in the Solarium but kids aren't supposed to be in there, anyway.  I really don't think there will be many activities where you wouldn't be allowed.  B2B Star Class on Oasis.  Wow....very nice.

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1 hour ago, WAAAYTOOO said:

Frankly, I don't think you really have anything to worry about with the unvaxxed children.  The only possible issue would be getting "up front" seats in the theater, as I think you will be required to remain in the balcony...but the Genie will still be able to reserve you seats so aside from not being able to sit up close, it will still be nice.  Dan is the one who likes to sit up front.  I don't think the seats in the front of the theater are the greatest so I wouldn't be disappointed with that rule at all !!

I had read somewhere (can't remember where) that unvaccinated (including children) weren't allowed in the Aqua Theater, which makes NO sense to me AT ALL.  But that wouldn't affect you anyway b/c you can just watch the show from your balcony !!  I think that must have been a misprint though...why in the world would they keep anyone out of the ATS...it's outside for goodness sake !!

I don't think the kids will be able to ice skate, if that's a problem.  I don't think unvaxxed are permitted in the Solarium but kids aren't supposed to be in there, anyway.  I really don't think there will be many activities where you wouldn't be allowed.  B2B Star Class on Oasis.  Wow....very nice.

You are right about the shows.  I loved being up front during Mamma Mia, but during one of the aerial shows, our genie sat us about mid-way up in the theater, and the view was so much better.  We would have missed so much in the front row.  It just depends on the show.  During this trip, we are planning on attending the shows without the kids.  The only exception is the more kid friendly shows that actual hold their attention like the ice skating show.  Obviously, this could change since Adventure Ocean hours are more limited than usual.  We've always had to reserve nursery hours but this will be the first time reserving time in Adventure Ocean.  With it occurring while school is in session, I'm sure it will be much easier getting hours than a school break cruise.  I'm going to tell the genie that we want to reserve our hours first thing, so we can make sure we get the same times for all of the kids.  I'm surprised we have not received the September guidelines yet.  They said we would have them atleast 30 days out, but we are currently at 33 days and haven't heard a thing.  

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10 minutes ago, Traveler said:

This is a cruise RCL is prohibited from cancelling ? it's our second part of the B2B

I second that!  If you are not already planning on it, you should blog your trip.  It would be nice having a blog to read on the drive to help get us excited (not that we need much help getting excited haha).  Look forward to seeing you onboard.

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31 minutes ago, Tiffeven said:

I second that!  If you are not already planning on it, you should blog your trip.  It would be nice having a blog to read on the drive to help get us excited (not that we need much help getting excited haha).  Look forward to seeing you onboard.

I am planning to blog it , so many things need to happen for us to be able to take the cruise as we are flying  over to the US , hopefully no new rules and things will improve soon everywhere. It's going to be our first B2B and we can't wait for it to start

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32 minutes ago, Traveler said:

I am planning to blog it , so many things need to happen for us to be able to take the cruise as we are flying  over to the US , hopefully no new rules and things will improve soon everywhere. It's going to be our first B2B and we can't wait for it to start

I absolutely wish you the best and hope it works out even better than you planned.  Have you received the September protocols for the first part of your B2B?

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3 hours ago, griffinjam22 said:

I’ll be on Symphony a couple weeks after you (Oct 9th) with the same itinerary. Looking forward to your posts.  Will be my first time on the ship and am super excited! 

We have been on Oasis and Allure and have two cruises scheduled on Harmony, but this will be our first time on Symphony as well.  I am so excited.  The Oasis class ships are amazing!

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7 hours ago, Tiffeven said:

I absolutely wish you the best and hope it works out even better than you planned.  Have you received the September protocols for the first part of your B2B?

No protocol was sent yet , just the survey if we are vaccinated or not . I even sent a query to check if RCL will acknowledge our Pfizer vaccine documents as our official certificate comes as a PDF. No answer yet. I think anyway RCL have not decided on the protocols yet , waiting to see the new numbers now with the delta is around. Hope for the best.

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Steven and I got all of the kid's new cruise bags and filled them with snacks for the drive (Tennessee to Florida), new masks, and new lanyards.  We were supposed to give this to them the day we leave for the cruise; but I am impatient, and we figured today is exactly one month until we board, so we caved and surprised them with their bag of goodies today. 

Giving the kids their bags got us really excited for the cruise but that excitement was intensified when Steven showed me that we received our genie email from Sunil.  I am so beyond excited.  

I responded back with our list of requests (we just edit our previous one with any changes every time we do Star Class) that I will attach below.  We also asked him if there was anything that he would like for us to stop and get him on our drive and we inquired about how Adventure Ocean and Royal Babies and Tot's hours would work.  I will update when we get a reply.

 

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For some reason every time I try to post a picture or a document, it shows as a broken link or "forbidden."  Not sure what's going on so instead of posting my document of requests, I will just copy and paste below.  Sorry in advance for the bad formatting.  It reformatted everything when I pasted into this.

Requests for our wonderful genie:

1.      For breakfast, we will have breakfast on our balcony.

2.      For lunch:

·        Embarkation day lunch at Playmakers

·        Some days we will have lunch delivered to our room and some days we will eat at one of the specialty restaurants.  

3.      For dinner:

·        Dinner at Chops on the first night (if not Coastal Kitchen filet mignon night)

·        Coastal Kitchen on filet mignon night (with the kids)

·        Dinner at Izumi Hibachi (without the kids but Sophia, Kat, and Nyssa will probably want it delivered to the room as they love Izumi), Chops (first night with kids and once without), 150 Central Park (without the kids), Jaime’s Italian (with the kids), Wonderland (with the kids), and Hooked Seafood (delivered to the room for second dinner haha or we will go for lunch if it is not a reduced menu).

·        We do not want to go to Chef’s Table.

·        Please inform the restaurants that they do not need to wait between courses on bringing out the food.  We would like to order our meals before we arrive so that it is ready when we arrive.  The babies get fussy if we are in one place for too long, so we want the meals to be enjoyable but quicker than the usual cruise ship dining experience.  We had a bad experience on one of our other Star Class cruises when we were at a specialty restaurant where the babies got fussy after a long wait on food.  Since then, we always request our meals at a quicker pace and the dining experience is much more enjoyable.

4.      Shows:

·        We will probably go to the Quest and the Love and Marriage game shows, but it will depend on the day and time.

·        We would like to see the adult (not family friendly) comedy show, Hairspray, and most of the other shows without the kids.  If it is a show created with kids in mind such as the ice skating show, we will bring them.

·        We do not want to see the Headliner.

·        We will watch the aqua theater show from our balcony and would like snacks delivered during.

5.      Our favorite snacks:

·        We love food!  Christian and Sophia are like many other children their age and are not fond of new or exotic foods.  Their favorite foods are pepperoni pizza, ice cream, candy, salt and vinegar chips, chocolate chip and sugar cookies.  Kat and Nyssa also enjoy junk food as much as their older siblings do, but they are generally a lot less picky with food than Christian and Sophia.  We all love fruit (with the exception of Christian).  Steven and Tiffany enjoy many of the same things such as spicy foods, shrimp tempura rolls, pitas and hummus, and guacamole and chips.  Where their tastes differ is Steven loves hot wings with blue cheese and the fresh orange juice from Park Café while Tiffany prefers seafood (especially the lobster from Chops) and desserts.

6.      For drinks: Steven enjoys diet coke, Tiffany enjoys sprite zero (strawberry sprite zero is the favorite though), and the kids will drink almost anything but diet coke and sprite zero are favorites. 

7.      Random info about us:

·        We (with the exception of Christian) enjoy Starbucks very much.  Tiffany usually has a grande skinny blonde vanilla latte or a tall caramel ribbon crunch frappuccino made with fat free milk, light base, and whipped cream with extra of the crunchies on top (depending on if I want a cold or hot drink).  Steven has a tall caramel ribbon crunch frappuccino made with fat free milk, light base, and whipped cream with extra of the crunchies on top.  Kat, Nyssa, and Sophia like double chocolate chip frappuccinos made with white mocha instead of dark mocha and with whipped cream on top.

·        Steven does not drink alcohol but will drink virgin drinks.  Tiffany will occasionally drink alcohol (frozen, fruity drinks) but not very often.

·        On embarkation day, we would like to sign up for our nursery and Adventure Ocean hours as soon as possible before or directly after lunch.  We would like to get the same hours for all of the kids, so that we can enjoy some adult time.

·        We are concerned about how Kat will do in nursery as she has never been apart from Nyssa.  She is always with us, and has only ever been away from us while in the children’s program on cruises or at Club Med, but she has always been in the same class as Nyssa up until now (she is two and a half and Nyssa is three and a half).

·        We are homeschool parents and the kids are with us 24/7, so we would really like to have some adult only time to connect on this trip.  We still want to do stuff with the kids, but we have not had any adult only time since our last cruise in March 2020.

·        We have a waterpark cabana at Coco Cay.  For the first part of the day, we would like to put the kids in Adventure Ocean and it just be Steven and Tiffany at the waterpark.  Then, we will pick up the kids and take them to the waterpark.  We will probably be tired this evening and may opt to have dinner delivered to our room, but we will decide after we see how tired we are.

8.      Requests

·        We would like to do a lot of the activities such as the flow rider, zip line, waterslides, Ultimate Abyss, ice skating (with all four of the kids), and the rock wall.  If laser tag is included, we would like to do it with Christian and Sophia while the babies are in the nursery.  Also if it is included and we have time and it does not conflict with anything else, Steven and Tiffany would like to do the Escape Room.

·        We do not want to do the Bridge or Galley Tour.

·        We need the coffee table moved out of the living room, so it is not a fall hazard for the babies.

·         All six of us want to do the cupcake decorating class.

·        We are celebrating all of our birthdays on this cruise.  It was technically supposed to only be a birthday celebration for Steven and Tiffany who have summer birthdays, but all of the kid’s birthday cruises were canceled due to coronavirus.  We didn’t want them to miss out on celebrating their birthday on a cruise, so we are calling this a birthday celebration cruise for the entire family.  Not to mention, Sophia has been upset that her past two birthday cruises have been canceled and she has proceeded to remind us of that any chance she gets.

 

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2 minutes ago, Jkaczano said:

I didn’t realize that you homeschool.  We’re just starting our 9th year of homeschooling.  Cruising is usually such a good mix of family and adult only time.   

I 100% agree.  Congrats on your 9th year of homeschooling.  This is only our 3rd.  We enjoy it, but definitely have those trying days haha.  Cruising is perfect for our family.  It allows Steven and me to get some much needed kid free time which works out great because the kids love Adventure Ocean.  It also allows us to do things with the older kids like laser tag which would usually be difficult with the little ones.  Plus the older kid's appreciate not having to tag along for the activities that the toddlers want to do.  Then, of course, there are so many activities that we can do together as a family.  Cruising is really a great option for families.  

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@Tiffevenwe will be on the Sept 11th cruise with you. The last of a B4B.
Our Symphony A2 Aqua Theater Cabin is the Aug 29th cruise. The other 3 are currently Grand Suites.

Tiffeven & @Jkaczano. If I cruised back then, a cruise trip would have been on the list. But raising 9 made such luxuries a little out of my league at that time.

However, the wife and I booked the Royal Suite on Navigator, March 25, 2022. Then, convinced my daughter and 3 grandchildren that live with us to take time off school and come on the cruise with us. They reserved the Ultra Spacious Ocean view, since there will be 5 in the cabin. But they will spend a lot of time in the Royal Suite with us.
I view it as a life-skills learning experience for the grandkids. Plus, the Royal Suite as a reward later in life from efforts obtaining a good education earlier in life.

I Home School my 9 natural children in the late 1980s, until my divorce. The transition back to public schools was easy.
Most were way ahead of their High School classes.

I started my oldest in college when he was 16. Being a student system analyst and developing a computer system for another college's Voca Dept, I knew how to back-doored the system. 

The college had an ROTC Program which young teens could join at age 16. Once my son had a college Student ID #, the door was wide open.
We just started signing him up for college classes when he was an HS Sophomore. At 16, he could drive himself to college.
He loved college over HS so much, we used the same system for his 1 year younger sister the next year.

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32 minutes ago, LifesEz said:

@Tiffevenwe will be on the Sept 11th cruise with you. The last of a B4B.
Our Symphony A2 Aqua Theater Cabin is the Aug 29th cruise. The other 3 are currently Grand Suites.

Tiffeven & @Jkaczano. If I cruised back then, a cruise trip would have been on the list. But raising 9 made such luxuries a little out of my league at that time.

However, the wife and I booked the Royal Suite on Navigator, March 25, 2022. Then, convinced my daughter and 3 grandchildren that live with us to take time off school and come on the cruise with us. They reserved the Ultra Spacious Ocean view, since there will be 5 in the cabin. But they will spend a lot of time in the Royal Suite with us.
I view it as a life-skills learning experience for the grandkids. Plus, the Royal Suite as a reward later in life from efforts obtaining a good education earlier in life.

I Home School my 9 natural children in the late 1980s, until my divorce. The transition back to public schools was easy.
Most were way ahead of their High School classes.

I started my oldest in college when he was 16. Being a student system analyst and developing a computer system for another college's Voca Dept, I knew how to back-doored the system. 

The college had an ROTC Program which young teens could join at age 16. Once my son had a college Student ID #, the door was wide open.
We just started signing him up for college classes when he was an HS Sophomore. At 16, he could drive himself to college.
He loved college over HS so much, we used the same system for his 1 year younger sister the next year.

That's awesome.  They actually allow students to duel enroll in college courses while in high school at some colleges.  I've seen several homeschoolers who are close to completing their Bachelor's Degree at the same time they graduate high school.  It is definitely a good jump start to life.  I also have to say Wow!  Nine kids!  There must have never been a dull moment at your house.  Our four little ones keep me busy.  I am so thankful that Steven is retired and here to help all the time.  

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Our A2 was on Deck 10 (10734) as it was the only one available when we lifted and shifted last year.  I have been checking the website almost every day hoping a Deck 9 would open up, and to my surprise, one opened up today.  I feel bad that I woke my TA up in order to snag it, but I wasn't going to risk missing it.  Initially Royal was having issues getting it booked, but after a long hold, we were able to complete the switch to 9734.  This was the perfect end to an already great birthday.

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10 hours ago, Tiffeven said:

Our A2 was on Deck 10 (10734) as it was the only one available when we lifted and shifted last year.  I have been checking the website almost every day hoping a Deck 9 would open up, and to my surprise, one opened up today.  I feel bad that I woke my TA up in order to snag it, but I wasn't going to risk missing it.  Initially Royal was having issues getting it booked, but after a long hold, we were able to complete the switch to 9734.  This was the perfect end to an already great birthday.

Yay!!!  My Oct sailing on Allure is also deck 10. I keep looking for an 8 or 9 to open up as well, but even if it doesn't, it's our first experience so I don't care ? Happy birthday!

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On 8/11/2021 at 5:03 PM, Tiffeven said:

For some reason every time I try to post a picture or a document, it shows as a broken link or "forbidden."  Not sure what's going on so instead of posting my document of requests, I will just copy and paste below.  Sorry in advance for the bad formatting.  It reformatted everything when I pasted into this.

Requests for our wonderful genie:

1.      For breakfast, we will have breakfast on our balcony.

2.      For lunch:

·        Embarkation day lunch at Playmakers

·        Some days we will have lunch delivered to our room and some days we will eat at one of the specialty restaurants.  

3.      For dinner:

·        Dinner at Chops on the first night (if not Coastal Kitchen filet mignon night)

·        Coastal Kitchen on filet mignon night (with the kids)

·        Dinner at Izumi Hibachi (without the kids but Sophia, Kat, and Nyssa will probably want it delivered to the room as they love Izumi), Chops (first night with kids and once without), 150 Central Park (without the kids), Jaime’s Italian (with the kids), Wonderland (with the kids), and Hooked Seafood (delivered to the room for second dinner haha or we will go for lunch if it is not a reduced menu).

·        We do not want to go to Chef’s Table.

·        Please inform the restaurants that they do not need to wait between courses on bringing out the food.  We would like to order our meals before we arrive so that it is ready when we arrive.  The babies get fussy if we are in one place for too long, so we want the meals to be enjoyable but quicker than the usual cruise ship dining experience.  We had a bad experience on one of our other Star Class cruises when we were at a specialty restaurant where the babies got fussy after a long wait on food.  Since then, we always request our meals at a quicker pace and the dining experience is much more enjoyable.

4.      Shows:

·        We will probably go to the Quest and the Love and Marriage game shows, but it will depend on the day and time.

·        We would like to see the adult (not family friendly) comedy show, Hairspray, and most of the other shows without the kids.  If it is a show created with kids in mind such as the ice skating show, we will bring them.

·        We do not want to see the Headliner.

·        We will watch the aqua theater show from our balcony and would like snacks delivered during.

5.      Our favorite snacks:

·        We love food!  Christian and Sophia are like many other children their age and are not fond of new or exotic foods.  Their favorite foods are pepperoni pizza, ice cream, candy, salt and vinegar chips, chocolate chip and sugar cookies.  Kat and Nyssa also enjoy junk food as much as their older siblings do, but they are generally a lot less picky with food than Christian and Sophia.  We all love fruit (with the exception of Christian).  Steven and Tiffany enjoy many of the same things such as spicy foods, shrimp tempura rolls, pitas and hummus, and guacamole and chips.  Where their tastes differ is Steven loves hot wings with blue cheese and the fresh orange juice from Park Café while Tiffany prefers seafood (especially the lobster from Chops) and desserts.

6.      For drinks: Steven enjoys diet coke, Tiffany enjoys sprite zero (strawberry sprite zero is the favorite though), and the kids will drink almost anything but diet coke and sprite zero are favorites. 

7.      Random info about us:

·        We (with the exception of Christian) enjoy Starbucks very much.  Tiffany usually has a grande skinny blonde vanilla latte or a tall caramel ribbon crunch frappuccino made with fat free milk, light base, and whipped cream with extra of the crunchies on top (depending on if I want a cold or hot drink).  Steven has a tall caramel ribbon crunch frappuccino made with fat free milk, light base, and whipped cream with extra of the crunchies on top.  Kat, Nyssa, and Sophia like double chocolate chip frappuccinos made with white mocha instead of dark mocha and with whipped cream on top.

·        Steven does not drink alcohol but will drink virgin drinks.  Tiffany will occasionally drink alcohol (frozen, fruity drinks) but not very often.

·        On embarkation day, we would like to sign up for our nursery and Adventure Ocean hours as soon as possible before or directly after lunch.  We would like to get the same hours for all of the kids, so that we can enjoy some adult time.

·        We are concerned about how Kat will do in nursery as she has never been apart from Nyssa.  She is always with us, and has only ever been away from us while in the children’s program on cruises or at Club Med, but she has always been in the same class as Nyssa up until now (she is two and a half and Nyssa is three and a half).

·        We are homeschool parents and the kids are with us 24/7, so we would really like to have some adult only time to connect on this trip.  We still want to do stuff with the kids, but we have not had any adult only time since our last cruise in March 2020.

·        We have a waterpark cabana at Coco Cay.  For the first part of the day, we would like to put the kids in Adventure Ocean and it just be Steven and Tiffany at the waterpark.  Then, we will pick up the kids and take them to the waterpark.  We will probably be tired this evening and may opt to have dinner delivered to our room, but we will decide after we see how tired we are.

8.      Requests

·        We would like to do a lot of the activities such as the flow rider, zip line, waterslides, Ultimate Abyss, ice skating (with all four of the kids), and the rock wall.  If laser tag is included, we would like to do it with Christian and Sophia while the babies are in the nursery.  Also if it is included and we have time and it does not conflict with anything else, Steven and Tiffany would like to do the Escape Room.

·        We do not want to do the Bridge or Galley Tour.

·        We need the coffee table moved out of the living room, so it is not a fall hazard for the babies.

·         All six of us want to do the cupcake decorating class.

·        We are celebrating all of our birthdays on this cruise.  It was technically supposed to only be a birthday celebration for Steven and Tiffany who have summer birthdays, but all of the kid’s birthday cruises were canceled due to coronavirus.  We didn’t want them to miss out on celebrating their birthday on a cruise, so we are calling this a birthday celebration cruise for the entire family.  Not to mention, Sophia has been upset that her past two birthday cruises have been canceled and she has proceeded to remind us of that any chance she gets.

 

That is some awesome planning!!! We usually get on the ship and wing it! ?

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2 hours ago, wannabecruiseexpert said:

Yay!!!  My Oct sailing on Allure is also deck 10. I keep looking for an 8 or 9 to open up as well, but even if it doesn't, it's our first experience so I don't care ? Happy birthday!

We have stayed in a Deck 8 and a Deck 10 Aquatheater on Allure.  We enjoyed both very much.  The Deck 8 was definitely bigger and my preference, but the view from Deck 10 was fantastic.  Both deck 8s also opened up for this sailing, but the price difference was about $28,000 more, so that was a hard pass haha.  While an A1 generally costs a little bit more, usually you won't see such a drastic price difference in an A1 and an A2.  The only reason for this is prices are sky high right now, and we locked in our price when prices were low.  Deck 9 and Deck 10 are the same category (A2), so there isn't a price difference to switch but if I had went from Deck 10 or even Deck 9 (A2) to Deck 8 (A1), we would have had to go with today's pricing for the cruise.  No matter which Deck you are on, you are going to have an amazing time.  We absolutely loved Star Class on Allure, and if he is still there in October, we loved Genie Alan.   

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13 minutes ago, LovetoCruise87 said:

That is some awesome planning!!! We usually get on the ship and wing it! ?

The planning went into our first Star Class trip.  Now we just make slight edits each time haha.  Not to mention, by day 2 or 3, we are usually tired and are like "Just cancel everything for today, we want to be lazy and do nothing but eat and drink Starbucks (Tiffany) and diet coke (Steven) all day."

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21 minutes ago, Lovetocruise2002 said:

Late to the party here but I will echo what @WAAAYTOOOhas already said, it's great having a live SC blog to follow!

Glad to have you following along.  I was really hoping there was another Star Class blog on one of the sailings before ours.  Having a good blog to read helps build excitement and helps pass the time.  Plus, it would be nice to know what changes to expect.  If no one ends up doing a blog before ours, hopefully I can answer any questions that people have and also inform of any Star Class changes.

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