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Need ideas on how to present a Cruise as Christmas present for the wife.

Goodtime Cruizin
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SharkCruiser24

SharkCruiser24

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That is so sweet! My DH would never be able to pull that off, he just says the magic words 'So are you going to book the cruise' LOL!! I agree giving her random gifts associated with the places you'll visit and a few things you'll need for your vacation and have the finale be the cruise documents in a nice letter or a jewelry box!

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CntPAcruiser

CntPAcruiser

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My husband surprised me not with the cruise (I knew about it already), but with a cabin upgrade for my birthday. He wrapped a large box with a sheet of paper inside with the new cabin number printed in bold. That was it, and I had to guess what it was--took me a while and a few hints.

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dpostman

dpostman

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Just to add, I know Royal does not do this, but for our Disney cruise a few years ago, we were able to setup a date & time that a Disney character of your choosing will call to welcome your kids aboard. So we had setup for "Goofy" to call on Christmas eve and invited the kids aboard. It worked out very well. We just put Goofy on speaker phone.

 

dp

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rjrice1

rjrice1

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We surprise the grand kids with a cruise... told them we were going to San Juan and staying on the water.... A huge house.

Also told them to get them on the ship... that we had a very special VIP day pass.

As we were eating lunch..after they were talking how they wish they could stay on the ship, hide and not get off..

Then we told them this was the Big house we were staying on..:D

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agentcorona

agentcorona

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I am doing the same thing for my mom. I'm buying a bunch of gag gifts for her to open first: a bottle of sunblock, cheap flip flops, a big ugly sun hat...all stuff related to a cruise. The final gift is the actual gift for this Christmas because the cruise isn't until 2017. It's a jeweled music box. Inside the music box is going to be the cruise itinerary.

 

She will probably think I'm an ungrateful daughter until she realizes the gag gifts allude to the cruise [emoji5]️

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princesstori

princesstori

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How fun! There are some great ideas posted on here. My question is how on earth did you keep it a secret for that long? I love planning surprises for my family and think I'm pretty good at keeping a secret, but I think I would explode if I had to sit on it that long. :)

 

Please post and share and update with us of the surprise reaction! Take care.

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madimorg

madimorg

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I'm doing this for my mother-in-law... we found a personalization website that had cruise ship shaped ornaments. On the ornament you could personalize it by putting a name on each person on the cruise ship ornament. I put the names of each person who is taking the cruise with her. (we are going with her and her sister and brother in law are also going).

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emeraldcity

emeraldcity

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By all means ... drag it out in bits and pieces ... make the surprise hit her in waves.

 

I surprised my DD with a cruise ... we had been researching renting a condo in Daytona, after having had to cancel an Alaska cruise due to an immovable conflict ... but neither one of us was terribly excited about it. On a whim, I stopped at a travel agent to chat about the NCL cruises out of Honolulu. It took me a number of weeks before I decided to book ... but I was afraid to tell her in case we had to cancel that one as well (I had some upcoming surgery that was a bit of a wild card).

 

Whenever anyone would ask me where we were going on vacation, I'd say "I found this condo in Daytona ..." and then I'd switch the topic of conversation. I even asked her if she'd like to go to a luau, pointing out that Orlando was an easy drive from Daytona and the Polynesian Hotel had a nice luau ... meanwhile I booked the Old Lahaina Luau on Maui, complete with traditional mat seating. I told her that we'd take a leisurely 3 days to get down there so we were leaving early Wednesday for a Saturday-to-Saturday rental. "How early?" she asked. "4 a.m." She copped an attitude ... 14-year-olds don't do 4 a.m. She claimed she was just going to curl up in the back seat and go to sleep. "Oh, no you won't," I told her. "You'll be too excited." She asserted I was wrong and I just smiled ... "You wait and see. I'll win this one."

 

So she packed for a tropical vacation and I waited till I got home from work the evening before to call her into the living room to give her the trip details. She sat down with the bored look only a teenager can deliver when they'd really rather be skyping. And I said, "Honey, I'm afraid I never booked that condo." She looked startled ... and pretty worried. Then I grinned, "Because the only thing that can replace a cruise ... is another cruise. The reason we're leaving at 4 tomorrow is that we have a 6 a.m. flight to Houston. We're booked on a 7-day cruise aboard the Pride of America." She squealed and leaped up to go grab her suitcase and pull it back to her room to start to add things ... the first of which was her formal. It was a good 10 minutes before she came back to ask what islands we were going to visit -- clearly expecting a list of Caribbean islands. I smiled and replied, "Maui, Kauai, Oahu...." She was so excited she was bouncing off the walls.

 

And the next morning ... I have a great shot of her sitting in the airport with the most sparkling smile ... at 5 a.m. ... wide awake and too excited to think about sleeping.

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Coralc

Coralc

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Wow, some very nice ideas . I knew a few of you would step up and make some suggestions. I like them. I think I'll mix a few together. I really like the ideas of buying a few small gifts, such as the sunglasses, beach bag, & sun screen. I also think the use of a RCL photo alum w/ "Insert Feb 2106 Cruise Pictures here". The album we have is actually two sided when opened. So I'm thinking of putting the Set Sail passes on the opposite side. Then have her open them in a certain order. I'll post on how it goes.

 

Thanks for your help everyone!

 

You must be the planner in the family. I don't think my DH would have much of an idea how to plan & book a cruise even based on the things we usually do.

 

It is always interesting to me that one member of a couple usually seems to be the planner. :)

 

Merry Christmas! And I hope it is a wonderful surprise for your wife. :D

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Goodtime Cruizin

Goodtime Cruizin

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How fun! There are some great ideas posted on here. My question is how on earth did you keep it a secret for that long? I love planning surprises for my family and think I'm pretty good at keeping a secret, but I think I would explode if I had to sit on it that long. :)

 

Please post and share and update with us of the surprise reaction! Take care.

 

It was tempting! So I told her we needed to book a cruise in Oct 2016. Which we did. So she's happy, content, so it's keeps the pressure off this one! Ha!

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Goodtime Cruizin

Goodtime Cruizin

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I hope this post finds you in great spirits and that you had a wonderful Christmas! I thought I'd report back on how things went! First, Thank you guys for the very cool creative ways that has been suggested. I chose to go w/ a few gifts to compliment to the cruise. But I had to be careful and not over do it as she would have been quick to figure it out. So it was a total of two gifts.

 

The first one was a nice halter sun dress. For the second and last gift was the cruise. So I used the idea of a RC photo album. The googled an image of the Liberty, added, the name of the ship to make it look 'official' just like what RC would offer etc. Then I made the info page for the LH side when opened, for the RH side, I printed the Set Sail pass. I wrapped the album & placed it it in a large box. She had no clue & was very surprised. I then directed her to the stocking with suntan lotion and a couple of pair of sunglasses.

 

Thank you again for all that participated and offered suggestions! Later today, we'll actually start gathering info for the planning & excursions.

 

Happy New Year!

 

 

Liberty1_zpsa5eljkpv.jpg

 

 

Lib3PhotoAlbum_zps8s9ydckr.jpg

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agentcorona

agentcorona

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I hope this post finds you in great spirits and that you had a wonderful Christmas! I thought I'd report back on how things went! First, Thank you guys for the very cool creative ways that has been suggested. I chose to go w/ a few gifts to compliment to the cruise. But I had to be careful and not over do it as she would have been quick to figure it out. So it was a total of two gifts.

 

The first one was a nice halter sun dress. For the second and last gift was the cruise. So I used the idea of a RC photo album. The googled an image of the Liberty, added, the name of the ship to make it look 'official' just like what RC would offer etc. Then I made the info page for the LH side when opened, for the RH side, I printed the Set Sail pass. I wrapped the album & placed it it in a large box. She had no clue & was very surprised. I then directed her to the stocking with suntan lotion and a couple of pair of sunglasses.

 

Thank you again for all that participated and offered suggestions! Later today, we'll actually start gathering info for the planning & excursions.

 

Happy New Year!

 

 

Liberty1_zpsa5eljkpv.jpg

 

 

Lib3PhotoAlbum_zps8s9ydckr.jpg

 

Very cool!

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