Smyles

They take the kids to the CLOSED section of the windjammer. We peeked in on our almost 5yr old. There were maybe 20 kids with staff in the completely empty windjammer. They could choose pizza or chicken nuggets and fries.

I gave up my teaching career to be a stay at home mom of my daughter until she was school age (restarting my career from the bottom now). I have no problem "pawning her off on kids club" to have some time with my husband. She LOVED it on both our cruises (3 and 5 yrs old).

Children (of all ages) benefit from parents with a solid marriage (or single parents with some sanity left) more so than they benefit from never having been separated from their parents.

To each their own. But don't judge until you (and your marriage) have survived toddlerhood, preschool age, school-age, and the teen years. Then, you can look back and decide if your way was the better way. But...odds are your way will change many times in that time span as you realize you really knew nothing way back when. Also, add a few more needy, demanding, needy children to the mix and see if you never "pawn them off" for a night out or a couples meal.

It's all so rosy and pink in the beginning...

We had 10327 on Harmony. We were prepared for noise but were rather surprised by the NOISE. We travel with our daughters white noise machine. We had that thing cranked to it's highest setting (which we've never had it at before) and we could barely hear the white noise at all with the balcony noise (not always just at times depending what was going on)!

This was especially the case when they practiced or had the aqua-theatre show. Seriously LOUD.

Our daughter (5yrs) managed to nap and sleep through a lot of the noise but there were times that the show woke her and there was no point in attempting to sleep till it was over. So we'd go down and ride the carousel or watch the show (again).

We had them come and replace the door seal (we could stick our finger between the gap in the seal. It did NOTHING to quiet the Boardwalk noise. It did stop the loud squeal from the constant wind!

We have no need to get another Boardwalk room. It was neat to see the show from our balcony (not a great view but better than nothing) but that's about it. I'd take an interior over the noise of the Boardwalk room. It was neat to try, but not neat enough to do again.

Nothing is set in stone. Try the sofa bed out on night one if you like it keep it for the week. If not then put a child on it the next night. If they complain then make the kids swap between the bed and the sofa on alternating nights to please them both.

If the sofa is comfy enough I would likely stick with that as it might be considered a tad more private since you aren't within arms reach of the other bed!

I can't hep but feel that the ideal that you have in your head is not going to be the reality when the time comes that you choose to book.

Just because there will only be 2 people in the room upon boarding does NOT mean they will let you book 2 more people now. You MIGHT be able to book one person in that room now. But they can't add a 3rd for a room that only sleeps 2. Even if one isn't going. Since you NEED to have all names on prior to 3 days before sail you can't just show up with an extra person the day of in place of passenger #1.

I would not wait. I would call now, as in hours ago. Get the pricing and options available and make the call now. Before you are one of the families unable to add more people due to life boat capacity. I've read it here enough to know it can and will happen again. Don't let it be your family.

I suspect that while she always speak German to you, she likely CAN speak English and will when she feels the need to.

I've met kids a lot younger than your daughter who have master 3 languages and know who to use what language with. It's all in her little head...it's just a matter of wanting and needing to use it.

Regardless...her being able to understand English will be a HUGE advantage to her. Should she decide not to speak English she will still know what is going on, what is expected of her and will likely just find a way to be understood without words. 1 and 2 yr olds can figure out how to be understood with no words...so she can too if needed!!

I hope she has a blast!

thanks for the review. We will be on Harmony in about 30 days!!! Can't wait, this will be our daughter's first cruise (5). Do you think all of the shows are good for kids, especially Grease?

We brought our 5 yr old daughter to all shows except Grease. We opted to send her to 'ship school' I was glad we did. There were plenty of kids there but the content isn't ideal in my mind. It's all about teens wanting to get laid, teen pregnancy and such. It's just not something I need my 5 yr old seeing and asking me about for all eternity. BUT my daughter picks up on things, digs deep and demands details and more info. So we would really be answering questions for months to come. Other kids perhaps wouldn't care or pick up on it.

We do a lot of theatre so she is well trained with sitting quietly. But I would think most children would be very engaged with the aqua-theatre shows and ice shows so definitely see those. The headliner (ventriloquist) was really good and totally acceptable for 5yr olds. Columbus was very musical and had great stage props so is worth bringing her to as well!

How long is the drive? I would look for a mi-fold or bubble bum for each child and have an adult in back with them to ensure they stay seated properly. As long as you aren't driving for hours and they don't plan to sleep in the car it should work fine. Our 5yr old is still harnessed but I would consider this for a short drive on a trip. I would prefer the bubble bum booster over a provided car seat. You just don't know the history of that seat, it may be expired, or damaged. A properly used booster is safer than an expired/damaged/improperly installed harness seat.

Am I the ONLY person that found the room FREEZING? On Harmony last month I had to keep the thermostat near the fullest red setting. Which I do not think made any heat blow into the room, just less a/c. Frigid. A few nights I woke a tad warm and was able to turn it down just a bit, but still in the red zone.

I am Canadian and we are cheap so we don't really keep the house that warm in the winter (drop the heat to 18c/64f overnight and that is the main floor, upstairs it is a few degrees cooler). But our room was quite a bit colder than what I am used too!!

If she is in Adventure Ocean/Aquanauts 3-5 yo they will give you a phone automatically...no worries.

We were never offered one with our 4yr old on harmony. I also do not recall one ever being offered/handed out to the people ahead of us while we waited to drop off.

I buy a LOT of over the counter medicines for my daughter when we cruise (and travel). We have never needed anything, not even tylenol but I bring a LOT as there would be nothing worse than having a sick child on vacation with no way to buy what is needed. All sorts of creams, medicines, electrolytes etc. I also bring everything we as adults could need, because it would be even worse to have both adults completely sick with healthy busy kids in a tiny room!! Again, we've never needed to use any of it. But it's peace of mind.

Our most important thing to pack when traveling is a white noise machine. It drowns out noises and helps everyone sleep better, especially when we are all in one tiny room together. If you have a balcony and plan to use it while they nap bring a monitor. You will not hear them inside the room. The wind is loud. We brought our video monitor 2 weeks ago on Harmony and I could see my daughter. I couldn't hear her as it was just too loud on the balcony but I could see her. My daughter is almost 5. She is NOT one to run off and she is still trained to stay in bed until we come get her. But my concern was her waking, not seeing us and forgetting we are on the balcony. Then she would go in the hall, with the door locking behind her. She'd then panic. Likely forget which room she came out and even if she did we wouldn't hear her knocking on it. Needless to say, I liked being able to see her so I could go in when she got up.

Bring tear free shampoo. We learned that the hard way when we went to Cuba with a not quite 2 yr old. We always needed less clothes than we pack for our daughter. Last trip I packed much less than usual for her and still didn't need it all. Maybe it is just my kid but somehow on vacation she is way less messy!

Very few toys. My daughter is happy with just a few toy cars and a few favorite stuffed animals.

We did this tour on our Carnival cruise (our first ever cruise). It was well worth doing. But, we don't feel the need to do it again on any other ships we sail. It's a once in a life time kind of thing. We also saw the laundry rooms, the food storage, garbage areas, crew bar. All sorts of really neat places. It is pretty neat to see behind the scenes.

I'll note the ONE time the elevator was empty was the one time I had multiple plates of food from the windjammer. Very hard to push the button with a plate in each hand...barely managed to press it before passing my floor. I was thankful to not have people leaning over my food...but just one person to push the button for me would have been helpful!!!

Do NOT book the boardwalk and expect to leave the door open while someone sleeps. They often did practices for the aquatheatre shows while my daughter napped. Very cool to watch but even with the door fully closed it was LOUD inside. We brought our video baby monitor. We couldn't hear the monitor on the balcony (boardwalk noise drowned out monitor on full volume) but we could see her on the video. Our daughter is nearly and very well trained to not get out of bed until we come. My fear is she will wake, panic that we are not there, forget we are on the balcony and go out into the hall to find us. Then the door will lock as it closes behind her and we'd be reading away on the balcony while she is in the hall freaking out. Again it is not something our daughter has ever done, or that would likely ever happen but it did concern me enough to bring the monitor so I could relax and have a visual on her as she slept inside.

My biggest tip would be to bring a white noise machine for in the room (no matter what room)! It helps drown out noises both day and night :-) Though, the boardwalk noises during a show completely drowned out our noise machine on full volume (first time we've ever had it on full volume).

Our daughter was in the 2-5yr old group (a week ago at just under 5yrs and a while back at 3.5yrs). They are open 9-12, 2-5, and 7-10. Plus 10pm-2am for a fee. On port days they open early, I saw it open 7am one day but it might be dependent on time in port. I believe it was just tvs shows until 9am (we never tried but they listed it as cartoons viewing). They also stay open all day on port days bringing the kids for lunch.

Our daughter went daily for anywhere from 1hr-3hrs. She would have lived there had we let her. She did one supper with them, just for fun and she LOVED it. It's really not fancy they play from 5-6pm, walked to the windjammer (the closed section and are served either pizza or chicken nuggets) then walk back. They can stay through the 7pm-10pm session after. We went and peeked in on them during dinner (she didn't know). It was pretty calm, maybe 25 kids of all ages, 4 teachers. They were all seated, eating and chatting.

We did my time dining and it was not that long an hour, maybe a bit longer most nights. On our last cruise we did the early seating and sent her off to kids club 40minutes in. They would speed up her full meal while my husband and I had appetizers. Then we'd walk her to the lobby, sign her up and go back to our table. They would wait for the group to arrive, talk the elevator up to kids club. There only ever seemed to be maybe 5-8 kid doing this each evening.

On our Harmony cruise Feb 10-17 there were 170 kids ages 3-5. We were never turned away from kids club, there were regulars there that my daughter made good friends with and then random kids as well. But it never seemed that busy maybe 15 kids total when we picked up or dropped off. No idea if they filled up while we weren't there. I suspect the late evening option 10pm onwards might be popular for parents to be out having fun. We we are boring. Our daughter went to every show with us aside from the comedy show and Grease (didn't want to have to field all the teen pregnancy questions for months to come).

As a side note, our daughter hadn't napped since the spring but she slept 2hrs every afternoon then slept from 12midnight until 7:30am (when we woke her). This allowed us all to get in the most shows etc and prevent her from melting down. She was well rested the whole cruise and it was because of that mid-day nap. At home she sleeps 6pm-7am every night so she was working on a big sleep deficit but the naps kept her strong. I was more than happy to read books in the room/balcony each afternoon but really didn't want to be stuck in the room 13hrs every night!

We got buy one get one free milk shakes at Johnny Rockets last week as a gold reward on our card. It came in handy when we went for our free lunch there (Boardwalk room) and had told our 4 yr old we were going for milk shakes to find out milk shakes weren't included.

While not the same age group last week on Harmony (not that many kids compared to spring break) I watched a family with a teary 5 yr old try and move him in to the 6-8 year old group to be with his older sister. The head camp lady was called down and she said it was just not possible to let a 5 yr old in with the 6-8 year olds for safety reasons. The family then tried to move the sister into the 3-5yr old group. Which was also not allowed for the safety of the 3-5yr olds. The only allowance that was made was the older sister could go in the younger program for 5-10minutes while the younger child calmed BUT she had to sit on the side and watch and could not participate in anything.

So...it wasn't a full ship but they were already pretty strict on the ages. On march break I would NOT expect to have them in the same group by any means. The good news is there should be plenty of kids their ages to make friends with so send them to the first intro meeting and hope for the best!!

How old is your daughter? Our daughter has always slept on the sofa beds unfolded. She's turning 5 in a week. We push the chair in the room up along side the sofa to keep her and her bears from falling out. The beds on Harmony last week were perfectly designed for this as the sofa back removes to make it wider. But even on the Allure with the back staying on she had room.

They did a 2pm and 4pm show in aqua theatre on day 7 last week. No reservations for it. We missed both due to schedule conflicts :-(

While on board last week we wanted to leave extra for our room attendant (did the prepaid grats as well). We only had Canadian $ with us, I stopped at guest services to ask if there was a way to exchange our money to leave extra tips and the man looked at me like I was weird and said to just give him the Canadian money. I asked if they were able to easily convert it themselves and he assured me that the staff had no issues exchanging money.

Also, you can leave extra tips on your account that will be charged to your credit card on file if you don't have cash on hand. They just flag it on your account to go to specific people as additional tips.

We just got off the Eastern Harmony today. We had some very windy days (where things were closed and postponed). They said this is normal for the Eastern route this time of year. No idea how different it is on the Western (we did Allure western in October and did not have those winds) or in April versus Feb but it might be something worth considering.

A taxi is merely a car with a sign on it. It is no safer to ride in than a regular car.

We just returned from our cruise, our 4yr11month old was in her car seat, we lugged it around on a small luggage cart when she wasn't in it and installed it on all planes and in the taxis.

We have a good system (plane and taxi) she hops in the empty seat while I install her seat, then she hops in and buckles up while I get settled. While doing this my husband is putting the carry-ons in their spots or loading suitcases in the trunk.

Our daughter will continue to travel in the same method in taxi's/ubers as she does in our personal car (harnessed seats, booster etc) as there is absolutely no reason that a taxi doesn't suffer the same consequences of physics in an accident.

You can also look at buying a cheap travel car seat. There are some that sell for about $40-$50 which is substantially less than paying for a rental seat or special shuttles each way. In the USA I believe you have a Cosco Scenera Next seat which fits kids a long time and is nice and cheap and light weight.

Also, look at getting a luggage roller. We use a Samsung suitcase cart to lug our daughters car seat (it weighs 28lbs with a steel frame). Our daughter is almost 5 but we still lug her seat on the plane as we need it where ever we go. We just pop it on the little cart, throw our carry on back pack on it, strap it on and pull it. On the plane the backpack goes under my seat, install car seat and the cart just collapses down super small.

I LOVE having my daughter buckled in for the plane ride (we travel fairly frequently). She is comfy and secure and when she was your daughters age we never had to worry about her unbuckling herself (plane seat belts are so easy for 2yr olds to unbuckle).

My friends husband is a pilot and it is quite common for him to have to delay flights while parents and flight attendants try to convince a freaking out toddler that they need to sit and stay buckled for take off. The plane will not take off until they remain seated and he has had to remove families from the plane because after an hour of trying it just wasn't going to happen. Car seats are life savers - not just in cars...but for parental sanity on air planes :-) !

I just picked up 6 novels from the library to add to my current book for our upcoming cruise (plus a week on the beach). Our daughter naps and I take that time to veg out with a book. I read fast.

I have no interest in reading on a screen. I did almost think about getting a kindle a short while back. Because traveling with 7 books isnt ideal. But I would only ever use it on travel so there is no point.

We visit the library weekly. It is not unusual for me to take 20-40 books out in a visit (mostly kids books). Our 4 yr old is reading incredibly well on her own and hates repetition. We had a period recently where she was reading 4-8books to us a day (before and after kindergarten). I hit up 5 libraries in our city on one day in November collecting books she was capable of reading on her own. Took out just under 50books for her that day. They were all read and returned within 2 weeks. Quite certain she would not read nearly as much if all she had was a screen. There is just something amazing and rewarding about closing the book when done.

While I see many changes in our public library (loaning musical instruments, more computers, 3d printers etc) I hope for everyone's sake that libraries are around for a longggggg time coming. It would be a shame for kids to learn to read solely on digital print. A shame.

I am 35 by the way.

Any idea how those arrival times are allotted? Still trying to figure why my husband was offered a 10-10:30 arrival but my daughter and I were only offered 1pm onwards slots. Same reservation, same room, same number of crown and anchor points (second cruise). I had to back track our signing up to go back to his page to click the button that joined my daughter and I to his 10-10:30am time slot. Otherwise we were supposed to arrive 3hrs after he did. Any thoughts as to why?