Stacie.

Based on your choices, I'd do Mariner of the Seas. I have a very athletic 14 year old daughter and she would love the activities offered on that ship (we did Navigator of the Seas last year and there was plenty to keep her busy and it didn't have as many options as the Mariner has). It looks like there is laser tag, a trampoline thing, rock wall, surfing simulator, mini golf, sports courts, running track, an escape room (I wondered how long it would be before ships starting doing those, they are great fun!!), ice skating, waterslides, table tennis, etc. I don't know if there is a minimum age for the gym. I've only gone on Royal Caribbean that one time, but the courts were always filled with adult males so my DD never got a chance to play basketball, and the lines for the FlowRider were very long so after doing it a few times and waiting out in the hot sun for her turn, she opted to do other things.  

Yay! The other cakes were beautiful but meh. Can't wait to try these!

I know that now, that trip was the first one we did when kids were old enough for boosters.  At the time it was frustrating because when we dropped off our checked bags the ticket agent told us otherwise (if we had known we would’ve checked the boosters with our bags instead of lugging them around). It was a fairly full flight so there was really no room to store them in the overhead compartment. The airline gave us a backless booster and an infant seat to use for a couple of days until they found and delivered our car seats. The infant car seat had a luggage tag from someone else so I don’t know if it was just not claimed from another flight or what was going on there. I know that I would’ve removed the tag before I gave it to someone to use. 🤷🏻‍♀️ 

At at any rate, I’m glad to have teenagers now and no more car seats, diapers, and strollers to deal with. 😉

This is such a pet peeve of mine. It's so irritating to attempt to find two loungers together so DH and I can relax while the kids are in the pool. I think the part that irritates me the most is that the amount of chairs covered in items is far greater than the people in the pool. Where do they wander off to and why can't they bring their junk with them? I can usually find several chairs together with folded towels so I just stack them all on one lounger and DH and I claim the loungers. We set the kids' stuff (cover ups, watches, glasses) in a tote bag I bring with me that also has my book, sunscreen, water bottle, etc. I keep that in between DH and me and stack their towels on top of it. We try to do our best to not be chair hogs. When the kids are swimming by themselves I tell them to stack everything on a regular chair that isn't being used, or just on one lounger.

Where were those carts when my kids were little? Navigating through an airport was interesting with a 4, 3, 2, and 1 yo and all of their car seats, strollers, and luggage. Also super frustrating when the airline said our boosters were not FAA compliant so they did not let us use them on the plane and instead gate checked them and subsequently lost 1 of the 2 boosters and the infant car seat so only half of the kids had their car seats. That was a nightmare. 😞 

The driving methods of some of the taxi drivers I've seen at some ports are extremely sketchy so I don't know that I would take a small child on one. I'd use a bus if that is an option at your ports. 

I need to remember to pack a pair of dress pants for DH. I'm trying to convince DH that we should wear the outfits we purchased for a Gatsby themed fundraiser last year, which would have him in black dress pants, crisp white shirt, black bowtie and suspenders (we'd leave the fedora at home) and I would wear my sparkly flapper dress and pearls (but probably not the feathered head piece as I don't see it making the trip unscathed).  The three girls and I have enough dresses to chose from but I always struggle with the two teen boys.

15 year old is so tiny around the waist that he kind of needs an adjustable waistband but his legs are too long to find any pants in the boys' section that fit him in length. Men's pants fall right off of him and he looks ridiculous in a belt as it looks like we're cinching a gunnysack. 😮 He's determined to eat many ice cream cones on the cruise so maybe things will start fitting him. 😉 

14 year old boy has it even worse, as he is 6'2" and growing, and just about as small around the waist. 

The only solution I can come up with is to have them wear the nice looking chino dress shorts I was able to find with button up short sleeve dress shirts. We spent an entire day shopping and while they were good sports, it is not a teen boy's idea of a good time to try on 25+ pairs of dress pants that don't fit. We live in a rural area so our options are limited. 

I hope nobody we dine near is offended that the boys are wearing shorts instead of pants but I literally cannot find anything that fits them correctly (that does not require tailoring). They mostly wear drawstring athletic pants/shorts but they do each have at least one pair of darker colored jeans that fit (I make them wear that to our church, which is fairly casual). I'm not sure which rule is worse to break, the no jeans rule or the no shorts rule. 

13 hours ago, simplelife said:

68 is chiily to us Southerners.😊

It was -27 when I woke up this morning. Without windchill factored in.   I cannot wait to get to the eastern Caribbean in two weeks. I'll gladly take your chilly 68. 😉 

I'm not sure how NCL is, but I know for CCL if you have a balcony room you have to have at least one person over the age of 25 in a room (unless it is a married couple under the age of 25). We have two balcony rooms booked for our upcoming cruise and I had to put DH in one room and me in the other and split up the five kids among the rooms. In reality we will probably put the 15 yo, two 14 yo, and 11 yo in one room (they are all pretty mature and good kids) and the 13 yo (who picks fights with the others and needs a quieter room to sleep in) will be in the other room with DH and me. Sometimes I wish I would've booked a balcony for me, DH, and DD13 and booked an interior room right across the hall for the other kids and saved money but 14 yo boy is 6'2" and would not be able to stand straight up in an interior room with Pullman beds. If we have any issues (I don't anticipate any, but you can never say 100%) then we'll deal with it and have the two boys and DH in a room and I'll share a room with the three girls. 

We did a bit of a scavenger hunt for Christmas. After they opened their presents I pulled out one more box. The first box was a clue they had to find. They found it and opened it and it asked them what their favorite airline snack was. They answered and then opened a present (a package of biscoff cookies, which is their favorite airline snack, and it had a clue taped to the back of it). 

They found the next clue and answered questions about their favorite place that we've traveled so far, then opened a box with a pamphlet about passports, and it had another clue taped to it. 

They found that clue and talked about their favorite beach/ocean/sea/waterpark that we've visited, then opened a present which had a new swimming suit for each kid, plus another clue. 

They found that clue and then answered a questions about what their favorite activity was to do on vacation (answers were snorkeling, laying on the beach, hiking, eating ice cream cones...) and then they opened a box with a snorkel set for each kid, and each snorkel had a destination written on the lens with chalk marker (San Juan, St. Thomas, Dominican Republic, and Grand Turk). DD14 figured it out first that those were places where we were going on vacation but didn't figure out cruise until DH told them. Then the happy screams commenced.

6 hours ago, uprivermama said:

I’m so glad it helped! The first time we used it I thought, this is a game changer for cruisers!

It really is! 🙂And awesome for vacations in general! I would've loved to do that when we went to Disney instead of going straight from the airport to the grocery store after spending much of the day traveling. 

44 minutes ago, uprivermama said:

Instacart is a delivery service for groceries and liquor. We used this service in Fort Lauderdale/Plantation when we didn't have a card. You can set it all up and have it set to deliver whenever you want after you arrive at your hotel. It was perfect for us. I know there are other "brands" that do the same thing but Instacart was what we used. I believe we chose a Publix store near us from the participating stores and we were able to order both liquor and wine.

This is great--I live in a rural area that is slow to get these kind of services so I never think of them! I checked and can get both wine and soda delivered so we don't even need to walk to the gas station, plus I can also get larger bottles of sunscreen (the 3 oz rule won't really keep the seven of us free from sunburn for very long) and anything else we may have forgotten to pack. Our flight comes in around 10 pm so I could get my order put in when I wake up and have it delivered before the shuttle takes us to the port. I think I like this idea best (although all of these replies have been so helpful!).

57 minutes ago, schazzy said:

I found this right down the road from your hotel, you can get your booze and a meal

 

https://goo.gl/maps/gMyj66FyEG12

Thanks! It looks like it is about a ten minute walk from the hotel, so much closer than the other liquor stores. The menu also looks good, although the background on the website had me feeling like I had already imbibed a bit. 😉

Those are also good ideas, thank you!

Thank you both for your help! I'm not super fussy about wine as I can usually find something I like, I just balk at paying $28 for a $6 bottle of wine. 😉 

This is probably a stupid question but bear with me. We're cruising on Glory in a few weeks. We're flying out of Minneapolis with a layover at RR in Washington, DC before we get to Miami. DH and I would like to each bring a bottle of wine onto the ship as per Carnival's allowance. In the past we have brought wine from home and packed it in our checked bags for the flight, removed them once out of the airport, and carried them onto the ship. We are not checking any bags this time so we cannot bring our own wine from home. What are our options? I'd prefer to not have to Uber to a liquor store/grocery store beforehand. We will be using the hotel shuttle for airport and port transportation. I know the airports have duty free shops but am I correct in my understanding that you cannot purchase from there unless you are flying internationally? In my ideal world I could buy a couple of bottles of wine at RR on our layover and have them in hand when we land in Miami but I don't think that's possible. 

We are staying at the Comfort Inn Miami Airport North and I see there is a Mia Petroleum gas station a few blocks away from the hotel. We are already planning on walking there to see if they sell 12 packs of soda (if they don't, kids are out of luck and will have to drink lemonade as I am not buying the soda package for them because I don't want them constantly drinking it). Are gas stations in FL allowed to sell wine? I see there is also a liquor store a bit further away but I think we'd have to Uber to it but would really rather find something within walking distance.

I know we can order a bottle of wine on the ship but I would rather just bring our own. 

Thanks for any advice!

20 minutes ago, tallnthensome said:

A whole cruise vacation choice decided by ........ soft serve ice cream machines?  Um ........ OK. 

Well, they aren't the ones that decide the cruise vacation, this is just the (silly, in my mind as I don't eat soft serve ice cream) main thing they bring up when we've asked them which cruise line they liked better. Kids are fickle. 😉  Personally, I like different aspects of each line for different reasons. Now obviously this is just my very limited experience as I've only cruised once on each line. 😉 We cruised the same time (November) a year apart. I think Carnival's food is better and enjoyed the Hasbro Game Show entertainment (I'm probably biased because I made it on stage and won something) but I thought RCL's musical entertainment was better and thought the ice show was fun. I thought my kids would love the Flow Rider but the lines were always so long that they each just rode it once or twice. The basketball courts on RCL were always occupied by the same adult males who never gave anyone else a chance to use them, my kids were actually able to shoot hoops on the Carnival courts. They loved the kids clubs on Carnival but didn't care for the RCL kids club, however on RCL we were traveling with my extended family so they had 15 cousins to play with so really probably didn't spend enough time in the kids club to give it a chance. We had interior cabins on both cruises and liked the bathroom setup on our Carnival cruise a little bit better. We're splurging and doing balcony rooms this time so I'm interested in seeing how the Carnival balcony room feels compared to my parents' RCL balcony room. I do like that Carnival lets you bring 12 packs of soda and bottles of wine on the ship. I don't remember if RCL allows wine or not, but I know they didn't allow soda. 

I would totally sail either line again (we're doing Carnival in a few weeks) because CRUISING! 😉 (but my kids are pretty happy about the ice cream 😉 ).  When we launch them into the world and DH and I travel on our own we'd like to try a Viking River Cruise. I'm sure my kids would find it interesting but I cannot afford to bring five kids with on that. Plus I don't know their soft serve setup. 😉 

We've been on RCL and Carnival and my kids prefer Carnival because the soft serve ice cream machine is on 24/7 whereas on RCL the machines were only on at certain times so, especially on the pool deck, there was a long line. RCL also would not let them enter the Windjammer with swimming suits on to get their ice cream. We just brought cotton dresses to throw on top of swimsuits to bypass that issue but they're still sore about it. LOL