floating around

 our next day, the ship just hung out floating in the ocean...it's kind of funny to think about being on the ship just for the sake of extending your vacation, but we made it work for us...


we awoke a bit early and checked the daily 'personal navigator', to discover that it was a princess meet-n-greet in the main lobby RIGHT NOW - so molly thru on a dress (note that 'brushed her hair' was not in there...) and headed to the lobby with her prince to meet some princesses...

 

 

 

 i absolutely LOVE that not only did she get pictures with each of the princesses, but there was interaction...hugs, and words and holding hands...and to top it off, pretty much EVERYWHERE molly went on the ship, she was referred to as 'princess'...and she ate up every moment of it. 

after princess-ing, we headed to Cabanas, one of the buffet restaurants for breakfast, where Grammie and Grandpa had already started dining with the two older girls....not a shabby view to dine with....

and if you don't like to view out the panoramic windows, you can take in the spectacular mosaics that line the walls of Cabanas...

the afternoon brought some fun activities...the girls wanted to try the 'towel folding' class, so the other kids tagged along as well - it was a VERY popular activity - we got there right on time (which we learned was late by Disney standards...if you really want to go to something, plan to be there a good 10-15 minutes before its advertised start time...)  we had to sit in the back, on the floor, and it was VERY face paced...but fun!   it probably worked to our advantage that we had floor space to work on, rather than small 'cocktail lounge' tables that people who were early had ;)

lilly and jared showing off their 'dogs'

molly, maya and celia, also with their dog creations

porter and his dog

molly looked pathetic enough to garner tech support from a crew member!

maya and her monkey

porter and 'his' swan...

jared and lilly work on their elephant

maya's elephant

 after the 'kid' activity of the afternoon, mom, dad, andy and i headed off to an adult activity of bingo!  also - PACKED - and we were once again relegated to sitting in the back.  we had paper 'cards' and dad had an electronic bingo device, the equivalent of 72 cards per game...who knew?  the pots were huge in the 4 games we played (hundreds of dollars!) but, alas, none of us were fortunate enough to even get one away from a winning game...

 

we took in another show, and then got dressed for dinner.  tonight's dinner was the 'semi-formal' night, so we made time after the show to have family pictures taken on the grand staircase...it's not often the 13 of us are together, let alone looking nice...in fact, the last picture we had taken all together was pre-rachelle and taylor and was taken in front of the castle at the magic kingdom (not looking 'nice') and molly was in a backpack...as an infant...so um, quite some time ago!  and so this occasion needed to be captured.  and it was captured well...

 
 

  

  

 after pictures, we proceeded to dinner at the Enchanted Garden, the same restaurant as pirate night, only instead of the pirate menu, we had the restaurants traditional menu of 'continental market'...not really sure what that means, but it had my FAVORITE appetizer of the entire trip, the tuna and avocado concoction below...

 '

 i also ordered a lobster ravioli appetizer...also very tasty :)

 

 rachelle's appetizer was this cucumber roll....this was the moment when we realized one must often take the item's menu description very literally...

as always, dinner was fantastic, kids did dine and play, and the rest of us enjoyed a leisurely adult meal, always topped off with a fantastic dessert and after dinner liquor.

and then, the night's turndown service....a deadly cobra!