Originally Posted by
happycow
... Every CSR I spoke with said it couldn't be done, even though the seating was wide open. The best they could offer was 4 adjacent seats in the 5-seat middle row...
Sounds like you were up against the "all on one PNR" glitch. I suspect that if you had booked your family on two seperate PNRs - one elite + one non-elite on each - everything would have worked out. You could book yourself and one adjacent seat for a child and your wife would book another seat with an adjacent seat for the other child. You just happen to place the two bookings next to one another and get what you want in the end.
It is idiotic that we have to play such games to get around the CSRs, but that is what FT is for - sharing ideas that work.