My sister and I just returned from a surprise girls weekend at Disneyland to celebrate her 30th birthday. I’ll get to the specifics of what we did during our visit in the next couple posts, but first, I thought I’d share a couple of planning tips since I had to plan the trip while keeping Colorado Sister in the dark (it was a birthday surprise after all!)

Enlist some help
Since this trip was a birthday present, I wanted to make sure Colorado Sister had no idea it was coming. But, that made planning a little tough since I couldn’t really ask her when she would have an opening in her schedule. Luckily, I had help from my mom as well as Colorado Sister’s boyfriend. They were able to give me info on her schedule and also made sure that no other plans were made for that weekend. There were a couple times when I was positive the secret was out, but we all were able to keep things quiet.

Stay on-site
Admittedly, I was very lucky to have some extra DVC points to use for our hotel stay for the weekend, but even if I hadn’t, I would have chosen an on-site Disney hotel. Why? I just don’t think the atmosphere can be beat, especially when you’re planning a special trip. It was also important for us to have access to early morning hours, a perk for Disney hotel guests, so we could maximize our time in the parks.

Plan something special
I usually try to plan one “extra” thing for our celebration trips, just to make it extra memorable. Since this was Colorado Sister’s 30th birthday celebration, I figured it called for some “extra” extras, so I planned several things:

• Dinner at Carthay Circle + Preferred Viewing for World of Color — Carthay Circle is one of my favorite places to eat, so I knew this would be on our itinerary for sure. But, what I didn’t know was that you can get Preferred Viewing tickets for World of Color if you have either an appetizer & entree OR entree & dessert per person for either lunch or dinner. The viewing area is right in the middle and is only for Carthay Circle diners, so it’s a pretty good perk.
• A waterside table for lunch at the Blue Bayou — Another one of my personal favorites, the Blue Bayou is always a fun experience and if you can get a waterside table, it’s even better. I made sure to book an 11:30am lunch reservation – this is the first seating and as long as you’re not late for your reservation, you’re guaranteed a waterside table.
• The Fantasmic Dessert Package — I love Fantasmic at Disneyland, but I DON’T love getting there really early to get a front row seat on the ground. Booking the Fantasmic Dessert Package eliminates that crazy wait by allowing you to purchase reserved seats (an actual chair!) along with an assortment of desserts and beverages. It’s a bit spendy, at $60/person, but is well worth it for a special occasion.

The two dining reservations can be made up to 60 days in advance using the regular Disney Dining line at (714) 781-3463 or by emailing dine@disneyland.com. The Fantasmic Dessert Package can be booked 30 days in advance using the Entertainment line at (714) 781-7469.

Make the reveal memorable
Colorado Sister’s birthday was actually a couple weeks before our trip, just because of how our schedules worked out, so I had to decide if I was going to reveal the trip on her birthday or wait until the day we left. I figured it would be really hard to keep the secret as we got closer, so I decided to reveal everything on her birthday. I found a Disney itinerary template over at WDW Prep School that I used as a guideline for creating an itinerary and I also got a photo album from Michaels that I made into a “Disney Memories” album. But, I wanted to drag the surprise out for as long as I could, so I added a couple of pictures from our January trip in the album and then added these pictures:

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Colorado Sister was pretty overwhelmed when she opened the album, so I think it was definitely a memorable reveal!

Up next: Day 1 – From Colorado to World of Color

Exactly 2 months from now, the Colorado Family will be boarding a plane to sunny Oahu where we’ll spend a week at Disney’s Aulani Resort and Spa. We are all SO excited for a little sun and sand, but last weekend I realized that both the kids have grown out of their swimsuits, so that means it’s shopping time!

Colorado Princess of course wanted a princess swimsuit, so we headed over to the Disney Store swim shop where she picked out a Rapunzel ensemble. Everything arrived yesterday and I must say, it’s all pretty darn cute!

The cover-up is even doing double duty as she insisted on wearing it as a nightgown to bed last night

Colorado Boy is refusing to have his picture taken in his new swim stuff, but since he’s TEN (which means he’s almost an adult) he wanted something a little more grown-up, so we visited one of my favorite kid clothes’ sites – Lands’ End. He found a cool “kraken” (it looks like an octupus to me, but whatever) rash guard and board shorts along with some new flips. My favorite part about Lands’ End swim stuff is that most of the shorts come in their Slim option so they actually fit Colorado Boy. Woohoo!

Getting all these new beach clothes for the kids was making me kind of jealous, so when I ran across a cute maxi dress for a killer price on Zulily, I just had to go for it. It’s a little long, but I like it a lot – it’s very comfortable and should be great to throw on for dinner after spending a day at the beach!

So now we’re all set to head out! Too bad we can’t leave tomorrow

Our first Alaskan port was the town of Skagway, known as the Gateway to the Klondike, for it’s roll in the Gold Rush of 1898. We had an early meet time for our excursion, so we were up before the ship docked. It was very foggy, but luckily not raining!

Trip tip #9: If you have an early excursion meet time, or just want to leave the ship as early as possible on a port day, I highly recommend ordering room service to be delivered first thing in the morning. The options are more on the continental breakfast side and include things like cold cereal, bagels, muffins, etc. You should have door hangers in your stateroom desk drawer that you can fill out and hang on your door by 3am the night before and in the morning, you’ll have everything delivered to you. Quick and easy!

Our excursion in Skagway was the White Pass railway and Trail Camp combination. We met up with our group in the Walt Disney Theater and were led off the ship and onto a bus that took us the 5 minutes it took to get to the train.

We boarded one of the passenger cars and prepared for our ride from Skagway, AK to Fraser, British Columbia. Because we were going over the Canadian border, we all had to have our passports with us. Along the way, we had narration about the history of the area and the railway. The current set of tracks roughly follows the White Pass trail, which was used as part of the Gold Rush of 1898. It was pretty amazing to think that men seeking their fortunes traversed the narrow path almost 500 miles – from Skagway to Dawson City in Canada. At the time, Canadian authorities were requiring EVERY person who came into Canada to carry 2 tons of supplies with them in order to survive the brutal winters. So, not only were these men traveling long distances, but they had to carry a LOT of supplies. Quite a trip to take for what ended up being not a big reward – very few people found their fame and fortune. Our train ride was much less dangerous and the scenery was pretty awesome.

After making our way through White Pass, the highest point of our trip, we arrived at Fraser, BC, population 10. Here, the border patrol boarded the train to check our passports and then we got of the train to board the buses that would take us to the Liarsville Trail Camp and then back into Skagway.

Liarsville is a re-creation of what Skagway looked like back in the late 1800s, with a few old buildings and tents set up to show people how it probably looked back then. They provide hot cider and cookies and then you watch a short show. After the show, anyone who wants to can pan for REAL gold. Ooo, aaahh! They’ve basically seeded everyone’s pan with a few flakes of gold so that everyone “finds” some. Colorado Dad and Colorado Boy panned for gold, while Colorado Princess and I sat near the campfire and had some more cider.

We were there for about an hour, so with the show and gold panning, we had about 15 – 20 minutes to look through the gift shop and then we boarded the bus to head back into town. The lack of pictures from Liarsville kind of says it all – the train was definitely worth it, but Liarsville, although it was cute, was probably something we could have skipped.

Once we got back to town, we went over to the Skagway Brewing Company for lunch and to try a local beer made from spruce tree tips. It was pretty good!

The town of Skagway is pretty small – only 800 or so full-time residents, but there are lots of shops to look through and many of the buildings are historical landmarks – dating back to the 1800s – so we enjoyed walking around town before heading back to the ship.

Dinner that night was in Animator’s Palate and was the normal dinner menu (see the menu here - http://disneycruiser.info/menus_w2011/animator.htm). I had the baked potato soup, chicken and chocolate cake. Everything was good, although the soup was definitely my favorite.

Colorado Dad had the risotto, the beef tenderloin and the apple crumble. For some reason I only got a picture of his dessert.

After dinner, the kids went to the kids’ club and we headed down to WaveBands for one of our favorite adult-only “game shows” – Match Your Mate. Similiar to The Newlywed Game, Match Your Mate is always fun to watch and usually pretty hilarious. Our tablemates had mentioned they were going to try to be picked as one of the couples to participate and they were! She was sneaky though and told the host who was picking the couples that we wanted to play, so instead of watching, we joined in on the fun too.

After answering all the questions right in the first round right (yep, I know my hubby well!) and only missing one of the questions in the 2nd round, we ended up winning. Woohoo! The prize was a free day pass to the Rainforest Room at Vista Spa (awesome!!) and a bottle of champagne. A great way to cap off a great day!

Next up: Whale watching and glacier viewing in Juneau

Did you miss any of our previous destinations? You can get to all of the Cruisin’ North to Alaska posts right here!

Wednesday was our first full day IN Alaska and it was a day we were really looking forward to – it was Tracy Arm day! But, we weren’t going to be sailing through the fjord until later in the afternoon, so we had the morning to hang out. I got up before everyone else, so got dressed and headed up to Deck 10 to take some pictures. While I was up there, I spotted my first whale of the trip! I didn’t have my longer lens, but sort of got a picture of it…

Next up was our scheduled character breakfast! This is a fun breakfast where some of the Fab 5 visit each table for pictures and autographs. For our breakfast, we had visits from Goofy, Pluto, Mickey and Minnie.

In between visits from the characters, the serving team has a little bit of fun making “hats” for everyone. Don’t we all look fabulous??

Colorado Dad and I didn’t eat because we were heading to Palo for brunch shortly after, but the kids enjoyed a breakfast of chocolate chip pancakes, yogurt and Raisin Bran.

After the breakfast, the kids went to the club so we could head up to Palo for brunch. If you’ve never been to Palo for brunch, I highly recommend it. The food is incredible and the atmosphere, while still “upscale”, is a little more relaxed then at dinner. I’m actually not sure which is my favorite – brunch or dinner – which is why we usually book both!

Trip tip #7: You are able to make Palo reservations before you get onboard, but if they are all booked by the time you look, don’t worry! Unless it’s a really busy cruise, they seem to always have at least a few tables open every time we go, so you can usually get a reservation once you’re onboard. And I don’t know that this is ALWAYS true, but we typically book the first seating time at both brunch and dinner and then arrive a few minutes early. Every time but one we’ve been sat at a table next to the window, so if you’re  interested in a table next to the window, it might be a good strategy to try as well!

We were a few minutes early to our 11am reservation, but were seated immediately and welcomed by our server, Hristo from Bulgaria, who took excellent care of us. We hit the buffet selection first.

As if the buffet selection wasn’t enough, we also decided to order two of the day’s pizzas. The gorgonzola and grape and the spicy italian.

I know gorgonzola and grape sounds like kind of an odd combination, but it’s really the perfect balance of sweet and salty – really one of our favorites. Hristo also suggested we try the chicken parmesan (you know, because we didn’t have enough to eat already!) so we also tried that. It was very, very good.

Somehow, we found room for dessert as well.

All during brunch we had a spectacular view of the scenery as we sailed toward Tracy Arm and by the end of the meal, we were starting to see icebergs around us. We said goodbye to Hristo and made our way up to Deck 10 after changing clothes and picking the kids up.

Tracy Arm is pretty incredible. With the mountains towering above us on both sides, icebergs in the water all around us and wildlife around every corner, it’s one of those once in a lifetime experiences and something you have to see for yourself to truly appreciate. We ended up having really great weather for our sail toward Sawyer glacier – partly cloudy and in the 50s. The adults stayed on deck most of the afternoon, while the kids headed out to the kids’ club after yelling “Iceberg, dead ahead!” a dozen or so times and getting their fill of soft serve ice cream.

As we came up to Sawyer glacier, the decks were getting pretty crowded so we decided to head down to our cabin for a bit. Just as we got out to our verandah, we were treated to the sight of some ice “calving” off the glacier. That happened several times over the next 20 or so minutes which was very cool.

We spent probably 30 or so minutes in front of the glacier and then the captain turned the ship around and we headed out the way we came.

Trip tip #8: If decks 9 and 10 are full and you can’t find a spot at the railing on the way in to Tracy Arm, just remember that you go back out the exact same way and once the ship turns around, a lot of people leave, so you’ll have no problem getting a spot to check out the scenery as you head out.

That afternoon, Colorado Boy and I went and watched Chimpanzee from Disneynature while Colorado Dad and Colorado Princess took a nap. The movie was really cute and we both enjoyed it.

That night’s show was a ventriloquist named Michael Harrison. I wasn’t particularly interested in seeing him, so we decided to let the kids play for awhile before dinner.

Dinner was at Triton’s again, this time with their normal French menu (available here - http://disneycruiser.info/menus_w2011/tritons.htm). Somehow I missed taking any pictures, but I know I had the french onion soup (very good), the chicken breast (ok) and the chocolate mousse (good).

When we arrived back in our room, Mr. Elephant was waiting for us!

Coming next: Skagway, the gateway to the Klondike

Our first full day on the ship started out great, with the sun shining and the kids sleeping “late”. We wanted to attend the Disney Vacation Club (DVC) Members celebration first thing in the morning so Colorado Dad took the kids up for a bite to eat at Beach Blanket Buffet before dropping them off at the kids club. While he did that, I tidied up and made sure all our door magnets were out.

Trip tip #4 –  You may remember one of my previous posts where I explained how you can add some extra magic to your cruise by decorating your door. Not only is it fun, but it’s also functional! The hallways and stateroom doors all look pretty much identical so it can be tough to keep track of which door is yours. With our door magnets in place, we never had to worry about finding our way. Even our next door neighbors commented on how helpful it was to have the magnets up – they knew once they saw our door, their room was next You don’t have to do a lot – even something simple will help you find your way after a long day in port.

The DVC Member celebration is always fun. The DVC team goes through some of the latest incentives for adding additional points to your membership while you sit back and relax with a beverage. They also play fun little games with door prizes like waterproof lanyards and backpacks and one lucky member even wins a couple hunder dollar onboard credit (alas, we’ve never won it). Even if you aren’t a member, you can still join in the fun by joining one of the group presentations done during the cruise (there’s usually 3 or 4 different times scheduled).

Trip tip #5 – If you have ever thought about buying into DVC or even if you just want to see what it’s all about, attending a presentation on the cruise is a MUST. It’s a well-known “secret” that the very best incentives for buying in are always given on the cruises, so it’s a great way to save a little money and maybe get some additional perks as well. Last year we added points at Aulani and paid less per point than we would have elsewhere, got a $500 onboard credit and received 18 Fastpass tickets for Disneyland. If you do attend a presentation and Matt or Ann Marie are there from DVC, make sure to say hello for me

After the DVC meet, Colorado Dad and I headed up to the Outlook Cafe to grab a snack since I had missed breakfast. Added especially to the Disney Wonder because of its colder itineraries, the Outlook Cafe is an adult-only coffee shop/bar that has really great views of the scenery outside the ship. It’s a quiet atmosphere, with comfy chairs, so a perfect place to curl up with a coffee and a good book.

After our snack we went to go pick the kids up for the Princess Gathering. So popular, they do it twice every cruise, this is a mega photo opportunity with all the princesses on the ship in the atrium at one time for pictures, autographs and hugs. I won’t bore you with EVERY princess picture we got, but here are a couple of Colorado Princess’ favorites.

After our royal encounter, we headed over to Parrot Cay for lunch. Once again, I forgot to take pictures, but it was an Italian buffet and I remember it being pretty good. The highlight for the kids was the ice cream station, where they could pile on as many marshmallows, chocolate chips and chocolate or caramel they could handle.

Colorado Dad decided to head over to the Buena Vista Theatre to catch John Carter, which was playing in 3D. Colorado Princess headed back to the club and Colorado Boy and I decided to head over to the Disney Tunes Trivia session.

This was the first time we had done trivia on the ship (last cruise with the kids we had been sucked in to the black hole known as bingo), so weren’t quite sure what to expect, but it was a lot of fun! Charlotte was our host and Ryan played all the “tunes”. Each team was given an answer sheet with space for 20 or so answers. Each question was worth 3 points and you had to give the name of the song, what movie it was from and then answer a bonus question about the movie. There were definitely some tough questions, but we did ok – 3rd place out of about 15 or so teams. Scoring is all based on the honor system and the winners each received a plastic Mickey head “medal”.

After trivia, the kids and I headed back to our stateroom and we all hung out on the verandah looking for whales until it was time for the show.

No whales were spotted, but the scenery was starting to get pretty cool.

That night’s show was The Golden Mickeys and it was also formal night for dinner, so we got dressed in our fancy clothes before heading down to the theatre. We’ve seen this show several times and while there are some parts of it that are getting a little old, I really enjoy hearing all the music from the various Disney movies they talk about, so it’s still a show I enjoy.

Trip tip #6 – If you’re not into dressing up, don’t worry! You have a couple options. First, I’ve seen all kinds of attire during formal night, from ball gowns to sweatsuits (yes, really!) so you’ll be fine in whatever you wear to the dining room. But, if you’re not comfortable coming to the dining room, head up to Beach Blanket Buffet for a casual meal, or order room service and enjoy dinner in your stateroom. Either way, if you haven’t seen the show, make sure to check it out – you don’t need to dress up for the shows and it’s one I recommend seeing, especially if you’re a fan of Disney movies.

After the show, we went down to the atrium to the Captain’s reception where you can meet some of the ships’ officers and get your picture taken with the Captain. We stood in line to get our picture taken with Mickey in his “formal” attire

We wanted to do a formal family picture but Colorado Princess was beginning to have a meltdown, so she and Colorado Dad wandered around Deck 4 while Colorado Boy and I got our picture taken and then I took over so the boys could get their picture with Captain Fabian.

Our dining rotation had us in Triton’s (my fav for formal night) and the menu was The Golden Mickeys (found here - http://disneycruiser.info/menus_w2011/goldenmickey.htm). Unfortunately, dinner didn’t go great, so the only pictures I got was of our appetizers, but I had the crispy cheese ravioli, oven-roasted tom turkey breast and the Golden Chocolate Award. Colorado Dad had the bay scallops, the turkey and the baked apple and blueberry pithiviers. The few bites I had of everything were all good!

Once the Mickey bars came around, the kids were back in the high life again.

As we headed up to our stateroom we had a chance encounter with Princess Tiana and even Colorado Boy was excited to see her.

Tonight’s towel animal extraordinare was ready and waiting to wish us a good night’s sleep when we arrived back in our room.

Up Next: Iceberg, dead ahead! Sailing through the Tracy Arm Fjord.

Settling In
Our room wasn’t going to be ready until 2, so after lunch, we headed to a table near the Goofy pool on deck 9 to hang out until then. We were immediately approached by a server who offered us a drink in the commemorative Alaska mug for only $9.95 each. Gee, what a bargain! We each bought one with smoothies for the kids and the Drink of the Day (plantar’s punch) for Colorado Dad and I.

When our room was ready, we headed down to check it out. Since we’ve cruised before and are members of the Castaway Club, there was a gift waiting for us when we arrived.

After several years of the same red bag, they’ve finally changed the gifts to these backpacks, which I like much better!

Our luggage hadn’t arrived yet, but we put a few things away and hung out until it was time for our Disboards meet down in the Promenade Lounge on Deck 3. We visited with our fellow Disboarders for a few minutes and then it was time for the Lifeboat drill. You no longer have to wear your lifejackets to the drill, which is nice.

Bon Voyage, Seattle!
From there, we headed to the Sailaway party so the kids could see the characters and dance a little bit. Yes, Colorado Boy IS dancing a jig in this picture

After the party, we headed back to the stateroom so I could unpack everything and get ready for the show. Tonight’s entertainment was “Let the Magic Begin” which Colorado Dad and I have seen 4 times and could have skipped, but the kids enjoyed it.

Dinner at Parrot Cay
We had the late dinner and our seating wasn’t until 8:15 so we did a little exploring around the ship until then.

Trip Tip #3: I always see a lot of questions about which dining to choose – early or late. Honestly, I think it depends on your family – you know your kids best – but, there are a couple things to consider. We specifically asked for late dining for two reasons – first, so we didn’t have to rush back from excursions to make the 5:45 early seating time. Second, with late seating, you see the show first (at 6:15) and we felt like it would be better for the kids to be “fresh” for the show, rather than dinner, because we could always feed them early if necessary. What we didn’t take in to consideration was the time change. Cruising to Alaska meant that we were two hours earlier than at home, so a dinner time of 8:15 was really 10:15 for us. Needless to say, dinner that late just did not work for Colorado Princess and I think it was a big cause of her grumpiness throughout the week. If we had been cruising off the East Coast, where an 8:15 dinner time would have been 6:15 at home, it would have been fine. So, just keep that in mind when you’re deciding which dining to choose with kids!

Our dining rotation started in Parrot Cay, the least favorite of the restaurants for me, but we enjoyed a nice dinner, getting to know our tablemates and our servers, Yusuf and Buyani. I know a lot of people love pictures of the food but after 4 years of almost the exact same menus, with the same food, I was pretty lax about pictures, so I apologize in advance. The menu was the Island Dinner menu which you can see here - http://disneycruiser.info/menus_w2011/parrotcay.htm.

I had the Ahi Tuna, Parrot Cay Salad, Jerk Seasoned Pork Chop and the French Toast Banana Bread. I was not very impressed with dessert, but everything else was really good

Colorado Dad had the Crab Dip, Cream of Asparagus soup, Mixed Grill and Creme Brulee cheescake. He ate everything, so I’m assuming it was pretty good

The kids had Macaroni and Cheese and a hamburger along with a special treat

One nice thing about the late dining rotation is they do something called “Dine and Play” which allows the kids to enjoy dinner in the dining room but then they are picked up at 9:15 to go play in the kids’ club so parents can enjoy the rest of dinner in peace. Unfortunately, this first night, the club crewmembers came before the kids got their dessert, so they missed out on their Mickey Bars!

After dinner, we were exhausted so we just went to pick the kids up and headed off to bed, where the first towel animal of the week was waiting for us.

Next up: A day at sea

Monday morning dawned cloudy and cool, but luckily it was not raining when we woke up.

Getting to the Port and Checking In
Since we were staying in one of the Disney hotels, we could have signed up for the Disney shuttle to the port ($30/per person/one way). The shuttle is kind of nice because they take care of getting your luggage from the bus onto the ship. But when we found out the first bus wasn’t going to leave until 11:30, we decided to cab it instead because I wanted to get to the terminal as early as possible (I’ll explain why in a bit).

We were a bit worried about getting all our luggage to fit in the trunk of a cab, but it all fit without a problem. At about $15 for the 10 minute ride to the port, I think cabbing it was the way to go, even though we had to handle our own luggage. Way cheaper than the $120 it would have cost for the 4 of us to ride the bus!

We got to the port around 10:30 and walked right in to drop our luggage off at the xray scanner and then went upstairs to wait in a pretty short line to go through security. There are lots of people standing there to explain what you need and to answer any questions, so it was a pretty smooth process. After getting through security, we had to sign the requisite “is anyone in your family sick” questionnaire and then we were able to go over to the check-in booths.

They don’t like people taking pictures in the terminal area, I guess for security reasons, but Colorado Dad was able to get one picture while I was standing in line. The picture below shows the basic setup of the terminal – you enter at the very far end of the room (back of the pic) where the security checkpoint is located and then come over to the middle section where all the check-in booths are. Colorado Dad took this picture from the seating area where there are a whole bunch of seats set up and then behind that is where you enter the ship.

After checking in, I moved over to the supervisor’s desk (you can see me standing in that line in the foreground of the pic above) to check on…an upgrade!

Trip Tip #1: If you’re interested in upgrading your stateroom, you might consider waiting to do so until you get to the port on embarkation day. Here’s why – If rooms are available, you can upgrade for a significantly reduced cost to what it would take to upgrade if you did it before sail day. Why? Well, at this point they’re not going to sell those rooms to anyone new, but if they upsell to an existing passenger and get some additional money, why not! The upgrades go pretty quickly and aren’t always available, so  if you want to try for this, get to the port as early as you can!

Our initial room was one of the secret porthole rooms, which provided us with a porthole that was obscured but for the price of an inside room. Definitely a great value, but for Alaska we felt like having a verandah room would be nice. There was one available so we went for it. One thing to mention here – if you do upgrade, they’ll ask if you’re expecting any stateroom gifts to be delivered so they can make sure to get it to your new room. If you are a Castaway Club member or a DVC member, make sure to say “yes”! We did not do this and it took several days for everything to get sorted out with the DVC desk (they give gifts and do trivia phone calls all throughout the cruise).

After upgrading, the kids and I went over to get a picture with Minnie (which didn’t turn out ) and check-in at the kids club. The line for the kids club check-in was pretty long, so if you want to, you can wait until you’re on the ship and just do it later in the day.

Trip Tip #2: All kids in the kids club get a “Mickey band” which is a plastic bracelet with a scannable plastic piece on it that is used to keep track of them. It’s about the size of a large wristwatch. You have the option of either putting it on the kid’s wrist or around their ankle. For young kids, I would recommend doing the ankle. We originally put it around Colorado Princess’ wrist, but in order for it to not slip off, it had to be really tight. Over the course of the first couple days, her wrist swelled a little bit and the band ended up cutting into her skin. Luckily, it’s easy enough to cut off and get a new band, but we would have saved her some pain if we had done the ankle originally!

Heading Aboard!
After all the check-in stuff, we sat down to wait until they called our boarding number. When you get to the terminal, they give you a card with a boarding number on it after you’ve filled out the “are you sick” questionnaire. The numbers start at 1 (for concierge guests) and go up from there. We got group 6, which wasn’t too bad. I think our group was called about 12:15 or so. When they call your group, you have the option of having an embarkation photo taken or just heading straight to the ship. We opted for the pic

and then headed to the gangway. We boarded on deck 4, which was a little different. Normally you go in on deck 3, so your first impression is of the 3-story atrium with the awesome chandelier.

Not sure why they didn’t do it, but regardless, we were still “announced” as we boarded. From there, we headed to Beach Blanket Buffet for lunch. I took zero pictures of our food and honestly cannot remember a thing I ate, but I guess it was pretty good I guess I was too busy taking pictures of the view to remember much else.

Up next: Sailing away to an Island-inspired dinner.

Less than 2 weeks from now, the Disney Fan family will be on our way North to Alaska! We’ve got our pre-cruise hotel plans settled, our giftcards purchased and while our suitcases aren’t quite all packed, I do have my packing list complete. The only things I have left to do are finalize a couple fun things that we do to add a little extra magic.

Did you know the stateroom doors are magnetic?
Yep, they are! And if you’ve ever been on a Disney cruise before, you know that a magnetic door provides a blank canvas for showing off your creative side with any number of door magnets! Some people spend months planning their doors, searching for just the right images and while it IS fun to look at all the possibilities from the designers over on the DISboards (there’s a whole area for ‘em), I usually take a dozen or so magnets, specific to our cruise, and call it good.

The best part about a decorated door? It’s easily findable among all the other similar doors if you’re on one of the long hallways Just look for your magnets and you’ll never get lost!

Want to get started on your own magnets for your next cruise? It’s pretty easy as long as you have a printer and either magnetic paper (what I use) or heavy duty paper and magnet strips. If you’re creative, you can go wild and come up with designs on your own, but if not, never fear – there are several design threads over on DISboards.com filled with designers who are happy to create a design for you. Just make sure to give them lots of lead time and follow their specific instructions on how to request something.

A Fish What?!?!
Ok, in that picture above, you may have noticed a metal fish hanging on the wall next to our door. Every room has one, even on the new ships. Their original purpose was to provide a place for the cruise staff to leave messages or paperwork for you.

But, once again, an innovative Disney cruiser (again, someone from the DISboards, I believe) thought it would be great to make something that provided even MORE room to leave little gifts for fellow cruisers you met along the way, and thus, the fish extender was born.

Originally, the fish extender/gift-giving concept was a way to connect with a few people here and there, but now, several years later, it’s spawned a whole cottage industry of it’s own. DISboards members now set up “fish extender (FE) gift exchange” groups for EVERY Disney cruise. And, if you aren’t crafty or don’t have time to put together a fish extender yourself, there are several Etsy stores that sell pre-made and custom ones.

You can visit the Disney Cruise Meet section of the Disboards to find the group for your specific cruise.

We’ve participated in the FE exchange on our last 2 cruises and will be participating again this time. It is so much fun for the kids to find gifts waiting at our door whenever we come back and we’ve gotten some really neat stuff along the way. Some people go all out, making personalized bags, personalized jewelry, or the like while others provide things like candy, first aid kits, etc. No matter how much time and money are put into the gifts, every one is put together with pixie dust and is always appreciated! I haven’t quite finished the things I am making this time around and I usually don’t post pictures of the final product until after the cruise anyway (don’t want to ruin any surprises!), but here’s a little teaser of a few of the supplies I used this time. I’ll make sure to post the final pictures once we get back!

Of course, none of this “extra magic” is nearly as special without the people who participate along with us. Both the door decorations and participating in the FE exchange have connected us with people that we might not have met during our cruises and we have met some really great people. Seeing familiar faces around the ship and even out on excursions makes the experience that much better but being able to connect even after the cruise is over is one of those things that I truly love about the Disney community!