packyourpixiedust

We are looking to do a cruise in February. I like lots of winter vacations to get out of COLD Michigan. We are already taking a Disney cruise MLK week in January. I'm thinking of a 5-7 night cruise late February. I need something with a splash pad and maybe wading area for my son who will be 20 months. Which line and ship please? :)

(He's been on 2 cruises, plus we have the one in January, so we are well versed in cruising with him.)

:mad:2 more days at home....and no upgrade so far!!!

Call and see if anything is available, you never know...

ENJOY!!!!!!!!

I love having a butler on Celebrity. My favorite thing is having breakfast each day on the balcony. The AQ suites have that great breakfast menu too! ENJOY!!! :)

My son was 7 months old on his first Celebrity cruise and 9-10 months on his first Disney Cruise. (Travel is part of my career so it makes it easier for us to do that...) He is 17 months now, so we have recent experience. Celebrity would be preferred if you want to give the baby actual baby food. They have you fill out a food request form and will get you up to 24 jars of baby food. (In reality there were like 40 jars of baby food. You had to fill that form out in advance. I was filling it out before my kid had eaten any food if I remember correctly. I asked a friend what I should expect there.) They had organic choices as well. They would also let you specifically pick your cereal and formula. They allowed up to 2 cans of formula and we used a special sensitive stomach organic variety that they ordered for us. I brought enough food to get through our first port of call just in case they didn't have the food for us... Celebrity was great. You can accompany your child to the kid's club during certain hours I believe. We only did this once... They also let you check out toys. They had awesome choices. We checked out a standing table, I forget what they are called. Where they pull themselves up and stand and play at it... That food order was all just a normal service they offered for playing full price (3rd person price) for the infant... My son is actively crawling and he would just crawl in the public areas. (we brought lots of hand sanitizer.)

Disney would puree any food you wanted. But didn't do anything else specific for you. you could tell your head waiter in the dining room what you wanted the next day and they would get it for you... They had lots of dance parties and other fun things, but he didn't necessarily need to be entertained by it...

Honestly, for the price, and where the kids are at. I would cruise the line you like most for this first cruise, and then make the next ones about the little one. Once your child is over 1 for example, I think they will notice they aren't allowed to be in a pool until they are potty trained, so then you should pick a line more geared towards them...

Feel free to ask any specific questions about those lines. We cruised them in January and March of last year...

I feel you will have plenty to do. We did 7 nights with our son, who was at the time 9 months and there was a lot of group activities. He would have gotten even more out of it if he was older I think.

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We cruised the Fantasy for the first time in March. We will be doing one on the Magic this January. The best tip is that you can get Mickey bars in the dining room and delivered with room service to your cabin. I don't believe the Mickey Bars are on the regular menu. In the dining room they will add a bunch of chocolate sauce to your bar unless you tell them otherwise...

My son was an infant on our first cruise, so I cannot help much with age specific things for your kids.

Other things to note- Cabanas, the buffet for breakfast and lunch turns into a sit down dinner, I think with a carving station for dinner, and doesn't open until 6:30. It is not open the first and last nights, which makes absolutely no sense to me. The room service like most lines is included. I found it to be mediocre at best. My husband didn't think it was as bad... Just tip the person who delivers the food...

The night of pirates night there will be fireworks out on the pool deck.

That is all I can think of now. Have a great time!

We cruised with our son around 10 months old earlier this year. He was pretty strict about his dining and sleeping schedule by then. He also napped fine anywhere but would not sleep at night in a lot of places besides his crib. Upon boarding we went right away to the dining room to request a change to early dining (we booked 1 week before). We also didn't board until late. We were like 15th on that list. I would say try and get there as early as possible. We weren't switched to early dining until the next day. So that first night we were forced to eat the not so great room service in our cabin. They def went in order of when you appeared to switch to main dining- even though they circled and starred our request and added it was because we had an infant, all the people ahead of us were accounted for, except for us and one other party. That party was large and wanted a specific table location. (I saw the list). So getting there early will get you a better chance. We called and followed up often mad then we're switched he next day. We were on the fantasy. The stroller was to be kept out of the dining room but if we had a sleeping infant, they would have made accommodations. As to the shows- the 3 big production shows played during the day at 3. We went to that show each day. It was perfect. Our son would watch some of the show and sleep through some of the show.

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In Barcelona they would not accept anyone's luggage until 10 am. ( the time the last of the debarking passengers were off the ship).

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My son is 13.5 months old and had been on 2 cruises (both 7 nights) and to Disney twice. I get to travel for work and so we make it a family affair. My son had LOVED every trip. He won't remember but we will. He has loved spending that whole week with us or us and other family members including grandma. We get a little bigger/better room since we spend a good amount of time there. But it's great. And neither my husband not I would take the time off work and just stay home with him. We've been to all the ports a million times so those are super important anymore either. A pp mentioned it would be a waste and she is very wrong. It had always been perfect!

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well I am an agent, so I book my own cruises. But I highly recommend finding and using a local travel agent. Ask their policy about cancellation fees and changing a booking to obtain a lower price. See if they have an email address that they check on the weekend to get in touch with them during off hours. It helps out your community (revenue stays local and there is a local employee of Celebrity that benefits as well) by booking with an agent and you get their local expertise.

Have fun we loved our Disney cruise there are however a MILLION children everywhere. And we had our child with is and there was still too many children :)

Thanks for sharing about trip advisor forums, I had no idea!

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Can you explain the S class, the M class and what they mean ?

 

 

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So they are the size and classification of the ships- the M class (millennium) and S class for Solstice. And all the ships in those classifications are roughly the same size and have similar designs. That being said the first 2 solstice class ships have some differences than the last 2. But they are not game changers in my opinion.

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What do you like to do in there? Which is your favourite ship?

 

 

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I have been on 3 of their ships for 5 cruises with them. I love the s-class ships, but would do the M class if needed for an itinerary. Since the S Class have existed, that is what we have been cruising. We really like to relax when we cruise, but we also catch the evening shows. (When we are not in Europe (exhausted) or not traveling with our young son (he goes to sleep early.) We love reading on the balcony, my husband catches some of the talks and speeches, and some drinking of course! The martini bar is a lot of fun!

We cruised Celebrity last year during MLK week and that is a line with far fewer children than RCI or DCL and there were still plenty of children.

We had to make this very decision for next January- are you going over MLK week by any chance? That's our travel week. One thing- with that cabin size you are under the pool deck. That is a disadvantage for me but overall I picked the magic because of the itinerary. I decided to go with a cabin under the beginning of the cabanas equivalent in the Magic. But something to consider. The issue is in theory you will hear scraping sounds from the chairs on the pool deck above...

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One thing to consider the package isn't financially worth it unless the child intends to drink more than 2 sodas a day. They are served in cans typically.

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In January we received the Elite coupons one for each of us in our Celebrity Suite. The suite was pretty great. Tons of space. Have fun!

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What would you recommend for a first time X cruiser is it right for people in our mid 30s

 

 

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I'm in my mid 30's and I LOVE Celebrity. It's my and my husband's favorite line.

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I had one one day on a San Juan day- so it was like a sea day until 3 pm :) we had the cover up all day because of my young son who was with us (wanted him covered from the sun)

Ps I loved it and will do it again when we cruise in a couple years (once he's old enough to use the pools & kids club).

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What airline? The lines for security on American are insane and LONG. That would be my only concern. That being said, I am a risk taker and have taken that flight time twice- once I was first class, and once I have pre-check abilities. Both those things made it quicker. I would still do it. But be in the first groups to debark without your luggage

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I should also add that there a fair number of judgmental people on this board that make judgments and don't even know what they are talking about.

It is understandable that they said they could deal with a child that has trouble settling down, but accepting one that has colic?

 

If you told them he had colic you either underestimated the level of one to one care he needed, or over-expected a lot more than any ship nursery service provides. They wouldn't have.

 

I feel sorry for your son, being put in the care of others when you knew he wouldn't and couldn't have one to one care constantly, just so you could go to the movies.

 

And then to blame the nursery staff for them not being able to comfort your son who was in so much discomfort, despite all of the other babies who also need care and attention. But THANK YOU for your parenting advice since you clearly know a better way to parent my son.

 

 

I think you know you should have stayed with him.

 

 

ex techie

He "had" colic. Meaning that at a point in his life, he was a cry baby baby. However, at the time he was at the nursery for an hour and 50 minutes, he was just a baby that didn't go down for a nap on his own- he had to be rocked. which we told them, and they said they could handle. Also, he wasn't 3 weeks old and didn't need to be swaddled which is what they were attempting to do when we go there. And he didn't go down in a swing which is what they were attempting to do when we checked in on him 5 min after we left... So, yes, I know they didn't do what I said because they told us that specifically. My point was to point out the original poster that not all things Disney are perfectly magical. The day care room didn't work for us. And we attempted it once for less than 2 hours. How would we know without trying it. They should be aware that if they have a child with any special needs, instead of a super happy go-lucky child, then they should be aware, Disney may not do things the way the parent wants... They indicated that they could rock my son to sleep which is why we left him in their care, they assured us of this in fact. We also asked them to call us if there were any issues, and they didn't call us. Those 2 things are on the nursery. We didn't need to go and see the showing of Frozen, we just thought it might be fun, and since they had a nursery, we would try it...

But THANK YOU (all) for your parenting advice since you clearly know a better way to parent my son.

My son was 9 months on his first Disney cruise. He was a colicky baby so getting him to nap is a bit of work. We explained the procedure and went to the movies- gone less than 2 hours. They assured us they could handle him. We also did play with him in the infant room during the one hour early morning on sea days that had open play. My son was screaming when we returned to check on him and it took them quite some time to bring him to us. They also didn't follow our instructions at all for getting him down. We didn't take him back. Obviously he was much younger that the OP's baby. But honestly my experience was slightly similar to that in the review.

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We cruised with a tween on Celebrity in January and she had a great time!

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We too out child at the full rate for each and every cruise.

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