A Magical Bon Voyage!

Our family just went on the perfect family vacation!  We went on a Disney cruise.

In early December, Dennis came home and announced that he had booked all 8 of us on a cruise in January.  He had received an email from Disney announcing a rare two for one special.  He acted quickly and snatched up two of the remaining staterooms on the Disney Wonder cruise to the Mexican Riviera on the second week of January.  He got an awesome deal!

Of course, we decided to surprise the kids with it for Christmas, so on Christmas morning, after all the gifts were unwrapped, I told the kids that there was one more gift.  I told them too search the Christmas tree carefully to find an ornament that wasn't there before.  (I had looked everywhere for the perfect ornament of Mickey Mouse on a boat or something, but no luck. Finally, I found this glass sailboat.  It wasn't Disney, so I used glue and black glitter to add a Mickey head on each side.)  It took them no time all all to figure out what it represented - we were going on a Disney cruise!!!  Screams of joy and laughter and a million questions was the instant response.

Our ship sailed on January 8, which meant we only had 2 weeks to prepare!

The ships always arrive and depart from LA on Sunday, so we went to LA Saturday night, spent the night with Dennis' cute grandparents, and attended church with them the next morning before heading to the  harbor.

We were all pretty excited to finally walk down the gangway!

The ship was big and beautiful!  I was hard to believe that something so huge could float or that they were loading enough food onto that ship to feed thousands of people for a whole week!  Yes, we were really looking forward to the food!

Here is our welcome aboard photo, the first of MANY professional photos we took on board.  Last year, when we got our annual passes to Disneyland, we all picked out Disney hats that represent us.  (We couldn't find Luke's and Alex' was just too big). I insisted we all wear our hats the first day. (Yep, I'm that kind of mom, to my poor sons' chagrin.)  Be sure to look at what Luke is wearing around his neck.  We had come straight from church, remember.  CTR, Mickey. CTR.

It is so awesome.  When you come on board you step right into the grand lobby that is 4 decks high in the center of the ship they announce your name on the loudspeaker throughout the WHOLE ship.  "Ladies and Gentlemen, the Disney Wonder announces the VanBuskirk family cruising with us today!  Welcome!" Then all of the crew members who are lined up on both sides of us, and everyone else around cheers for us as we come aboard.  That was pretty darn cool!

Then someone kindly leads us to exactly where they know we want to go - to the food, of course.

At the front of the line to the all-you-can-eat buffet was this awesome ice sculpture of an eagle.  I love all the colors reflected in the ice.

The kids were in heaven, and they piled that food on their trays.  (Only then were they grateful that I had insisted that we had our fast Sunday the week before so we wouldn't have to fast on the cruise.)  They were pretty excited when they saw that the food line started with a huge pile of shrimp.  Shrimp! (My kids LOVE shrimp.)  And it just got better from there.

Once we had all had our fill, we took off to explore the ship.  Within minutes, all but Caleb and Luke had disappeared.  We figured they couldn't have gone far (one wonderful benefit of cruising) so we didn't worry too much about it.
 It is an awesome ship!  We loved all of the big round windows, and this area of the ship that looks like route 66 with old fashioned billboards on the wall.

The first thing the boys wanted to see, after the food, of course, were the two kids' areas, the Oceaneer Lab and the Oceaneer Club.  They are both on the same deck and steps away from each other, but both very different places with tons of stuff to do in each.  We just went in to look around, but they were immediately sucked in and didn't want to leave.

But we still had more to see - like the pools!  There are 3 pools on the Disney Wonder (4 actually, since the crew gets their own pool away from the guests at the front of the ship.)  One is for adults only, another Mickey-shaped shallow pool with a water slide for kids only, and the mid-ship main pool for everyone.  Above the main pool is a giant TV screen.  When we went up they were blasting party music and showing music videos on the big screen.  Other times they would show movies on the screen that could be seen from two decks or even from inside the pool or spa!

But no self-guided tour of the ship would be complete without finding the all-you-can-eat soft serve ice cream machine!  Yep.  All ice cream, all the time.  We quickly learned that if we somehow lost a kid, we would just have to hang out by the ice cream machine, and they would eventually show up there.

Before disembarking, everyone on board had to have a lifeboat drill, then everyone headed up to the top decks for the big Bon Voyage party where everyone was given sparkly streamers to wave.  The main pool had somehow been transformed into a dance floor, and all 2,000 passengers were there ready to party with Mickey.

We were ready too!

There was so much excitement in the air!  This was it.  We were ready to take off, finally!  What adventures and magic would this week bring?  We could only imagine.

The crowd was pumped, the music was thumpin', and everyone was ready to hit the seas!

First they introduced us to the different counselors and activity folks.

There is Derek up on the big screen looking so sullen during all the festivities.  Pretty funny.  I guess I was caught on the big screen too.  I was trying to yell at Derek to get his attention in all the noise, and pointing to where we were so he could find us, but on the big screen, Dennis said, I just looked like a yelling pointing mom among all the revelers. The camera was right on me!  Hilarious.

Man, what a party!

I made my way up stairs to see if I could get some different shots and capture some of the immense spirit of this party.  I worked my way around, and turned a corner and saw this...

Yessiree!  It was Captain Micky and his gal Minnie, getting ready to make their big appearance!   SO awesome!  They posed just for me, and let me take a bunch of pictures of them!  I couldn't wait to go back and show the kids all the pictures.

Of course the audience didn't know they were coming, so when Mickey and friends made their appearance, the crowd EXPLODED!

They did a dance, and Mickey officially welcomed everyone aboard!

Everybody was ready for a grand adventure!

After the characters left they opened the stage for all the kids to dance.  I love this picture as is gives you a good idea of the energy and excitement of the moment. There were several hundred very happy kids on that ship!

Caleb and his Jack ears on the big screen.

Then, just as the sun was setting, there was an explosion of streamers and the ship set sail!  (I absolutely LOVE this picture, by the way.)

Woo Hoo!

Leaving the LA harbor.  I love the full moon.

The revelry calmed down a bit as we watched the sunset in the west while the Disney Wonder headed out to sea... ice cream cones in hand, of course.

Beautiful!

We managed to gather all the kids together to see the welcome stage show.  We had heard that every single stage show was wonderful, so we insisted that whatever we all do each day separately, we all had to get together as a family to see the stage show every evening.  The first night's show was really great, and it only got better each night from there.  The dancing and singing and costumes were great, not to mention the barrage of streamers and fireworks.  But what I liked was that all of the shows had a message - that if you believe, dreams can come true.

Magic, pure magic.

After the show we had dinner.  There are two times for dinner, and early seating at 5:45, or a late seating at 8:15, and the stage show and all evening activities are also repeated during those times so that  nobody missed anything.  You either ate first then saw the show and did the activities, or vice-versa.  We had the late dinner, so we watched the show, then still had time to do another activity together before dinner started.  Then after dinner we could break up and go have some later-evening fun throughout the ship.

There are also 3 dining rooms, and everyone is on a rotating schedule so that they get to eat in all three at least twice.

The kids were most excited about eating in this dining room - the Animator's Palette, so they were thrilled that we were assigned here on the first night.

This is so cool because when you start dinner, everything is in black and white, like an animator's sketchbook.  The ceiling and walls, even the pictures and the waiter's vests.

Then, as we ate, things started changing.  The pictures on the wall were suddenly in color...

and the pillars in the room that looked like giant paintbrushes started to change color.

By the time dessert was served, the walls were aflame with color, and even the waiter's vests had been turned inside-out to colorful tie-dye as they marched out of the kitchen with Mickey himself, dressed, of course, as the sourcerer's apprentice.  He danced through the aisles and welcomed his guests.  It was rather dark in there by then and Mickey was kind of far away, so I didn't get a good picture, but it was pretty fun.

When dinner was over the kids all took off to their various hangouts and Dennis and I were left alone together, just the two of us and a ship full of activities and things to do.

 Alone.  Together.

That is when I knew, this was going to be one fantastic family vacation