Kicked to the Curb

I finally did it. Despite the doubts of many who have heard me promising...we actually went through with it and took away Brooklyn's pacifiers. What trauma! Saturday was her last day with it. So Sunday was a blast! Haha. She cried for about an hour before finally drifting off to sleep for her morning nap. Which only lasted on hour instead of two. So church was not so fun. She was cranky as could be without it. But as expected her crying has gotten less and less. Last night was her first night with zero tears at bedtime. I think it is harder on me than her. It is now day three of pacifier free and we are still alive. My poor baby is just growing up.

Cozumel, Mexico

Cozumel was my favorite part of the trip because the diving here was awesome! Of course we got no pictures because our 35 ft underwater camera could not handle the 100 ft dive. We did see some awesome stuff including an enormous spotted eagle ray (8-9 ft), and a sea turtle. The reef was also beautiful. It is amazing how much color and life there is at the bottom of the ocean. Below are some pictures of the beach we
rested on in between dives.





This is Cesar. He was one of our dinner hosts. He was so fun! He always had different tricks for us. He was from Veitnam. He only gets to go home every six months for a two month period. I would be so lonely! He didn't seem to mind though.


One night they made us all get up and dance at dinner. It took me a while to get out of the chair, but it was fun once I did!

Grand Cayman

Here is a lovely view of our ship from the beach in Grand Cayman. Isn't it huge?



These little crabs were all over the rocks on the shore where we went scuba diving. My nature photographer Josh chased them around to get a good picture.


Okay so maybe this is really our ship...



More dinner fun. Josh had some little lobsters for dinner...the whole lobster. Cesar, one of our waiters, brought his Grandmother to dinner one night. Isn't she lovely?


Under water pictures soon to come. I forgot to have them make a cd so I am going to have to scan some. We'll see how that goes!

Towel Animals

Our steward Stanislav from Bulgaria always left us some beautiful towel animals to sleep with each night.

Jamaica

Our first stop was Montego Bay, Jamaica. We spent the day at the Sunset Beach Resort. It was really fun. We snorkled and used the kayaks and paddle boats. They also had a mini water park at the resort with water slides, pools, and jacuzzis. It was nice to relax. Jamaica was not my favorite stop, but still fun.







This is Chandler, from Haiti. He was one of our servers at dinner and was such a blast. They always tried to make dinner quite the party. There will more pictures of that to come...



Yeah mon'

On the Ship

So I tried to make a slide show, but it is taking forever! So I will just do a few different posts instead to show you a little bit of our Carribean Cruise. It was so much fun!

Here is the sweet limo we took from Houston to Galveston to get on the ship. We were all excited like kids in a candy shop. It was fun. What hicks we are! This so happened to be a lot cheaper then the bus. How does that happen?


The first two days we were at sea so we have to entertain ourselves on the ship. The boys entered a putting contest. Dad got second!! You can see his victory face below. Josh got schooled the old guys. Katie got to be in the trivia game show they hosted in one of the lounges. It was fun to see her up there! She was making funny faces the whole time. I got one good one.




This guy carved this thing up in 20 minutes! They did this presentation out on the pool deck. It was amazing to see how fast he could do it. The crew on the ship are always colorful and talented. They hire people from all over the world to make the encounters a little more interesting. It was fun getting to meet people from different places and see what they could do. While on ship we also spent a lot of time playing games, going to the spa (for my FIRST time ever...so fun), and just spending time together. At least those of us who weren't sick. Josh and Nicole both spent some time laid up with colds and fevers. Kind of ruined a few days, but luckily not the whole vacation.

Update

I haven't updated in a while so I thought I'd do a quick post about what is going on. We have a fun New Year's playing games and eating junk. I feel like I started eating at Thanksgiving and haven't really stopped. Luckily I have noticed no weight gain. So...I continue to eat as much junk as want. Horrible I know. Maybe after my vacation I'll get better.

Brooklyn is now 14 months. She has already entered the Terrible Toddler stage. Terrible twos just isn't a good description. She is getting smarter and more demanding with each day that goes by. It is harder, but so fun to watch her grow and learn new things. She says a few words now and mimmicks what we do a lot more. We sure love her. At Christmas time I couldn't get people to quit putting candy in her mouth. So pictured are her loving blue lips and tongue. I honestly don't know what she ate. I sent her to my Grandma's with my dad and this is how she was when I found her. She sure had fun!

For those of you who read Katie's blog you already know about this, but I thought I'd post for those who don't. Sorry I don't have a great picture of our first encounter. Anyway, Josh and I got scuba certified last week so we can go diving on our cruise next week. It was so fun! I was a little nervous at first, but once you get comfortable breathing underwater it is awesome. It was really easy as well. The only bad part about it was diving in Sajuaro lake. It was well into the 50's in the water. We had wetsuits, but our heads we uncovered. Luckily our instructors were as cold as us and we did the requirements as quickly as possible and got out. I can't wait for the Carribean! It should be much better.

We have one last bit of good news. Tilly had her puppies and she had three: 2 females, 1 male. I put up a picture of the male. He is the only one that showed up with some brown color in him. The girls are black and white like Roxie's pups. We were just excited to get some girls and excited Tilly had more than 1. You couldn't really tell that she was pregnant. She stayed soo little and is already back to her little self.

I guess that's all for now. I haven't been taking many pictures lately so these are random, but there are the most recent things. So enjoy!