Summer! Summer! Summer!

Christmas Card 2013

Merry Christmas!!! Here is our 2013 Christmas card.

And here is the backside.

Disney Cruise -- Pirate Night

The boat had a pirate night and we all dressed up. (Some people on the ship had some serious pirate costumes.)

Here we are in our pirate costumes. Caden and Caroline were Jake and Izzy from Jake and the Neverland Pirates. (They were the same for Halloween.) We bought a patch for me and made a comber bun and head scarf out of some cloth.

Me with my little pirates.

Grammie and Poppa dressed up as well. Poppa has Scully, the bird from Jake and the Neverland Pirates, attached to his shoulder.

 Caden drinking his ice cream.

 Posing with our waiter.

 Jake and Izzy

 Caroline and Grammie

 Grammie, Poppa, Caden, and Caroline in their pirate gear

 We had a lot of fun during pirate night.

Disney Cruise -- Disney Characters

Of course, we saw a bunch of Disney characters while on our cruise. Here are just a few of our character pictures.

We saw Mickey and Minnie before we even got on the boat.

During our character breakfast, all the characters were wearing there Hawaiian clothes.

There were constantly picture opportunities with characters. Our kids were most excited about meeting Captain Hook and Smee.

Snow White and Dopey Dwarf

For Halloween night, the characters were wearing costumes. 

Donald Duck

Chip and Dale

Pluto

Disney Cruise -- Beaches

Our top priority when at port was to go to a beach. We accomplished that at our first stop in Jamaica. We docked in Falmouth and took a 30 minute taxi bus to a beach in Montego Bay.

Our kids had never been to a beach and we were very excited to take them. Here are the kids going into the water for their first time.

We spent much of our day swimming around chasing fish and looking for sea shells. (Customs confiscated the shells we tried to bring back with us.) I did some snorkeling and Amy got a 45 minute massage from a local. I managed to get a fairly severe sunburn because soon after I reapplied sunscreen onto my back, a local rubbed baby oil on my back and rubbed my shoulders trying to convince me to let Amy get a massage. We didn't think twice until getting back to the boat and seeing my back was already red!

Here is Caden with a couple of his finds. He has coral in one hand in a shell in the other.

 We also spent time playing the sand. We built some sand castles and buried Caden.

We enjoyed our first beach. Jamaica was beautiful and we could not have had any better weather.

The next day, we woke up in Grand Cayman. This time, we had a boat excursion to a beach and Grammie and Poppa were coming along. Here we are on the bus.

The ten minute bus ride took us to Tiki Beach. This beach was fairly different from the one in Jamaica. This one had more waves though they were all small. The sand was thicker and softer here as well. Also, the water got deeper much more quickly and there was a nearby coral reef to greatly improve the snorkeling.

Caroline was very excited to be at another beach.

 The same was true with Caden.

Caroline enjoying the water.

I love Caden in his goggles.

I took both kids out to see the coral reef. They would ride on my back as I swam out. I'd stop and they'd stick their heads in the water. Caden thought it was great and saw tons of fish. Caroline was a little too timid and didn't want to go out very far.

Caden and Grammie enjoying the water.

Our kids loved going to the beaches. We can't wait to take them to another. Grammie was already saying we needed to take a trip to a Florida beach.

Disney Cruise

We took the kids on a seven night Disney Cruise. We left from Galveston and went to Jamaica, Grand Cayman, and Cozumel. Grammie and Poppa came with us and stayed across the hall.

Caroline was apprehensive about going because she didn't want to leave home and her toys. On the other hand, Caden couldn't wait. He was so ready to leave that he played in the car for like an hour before we left.

With only three ports, we had a lot of time at sea to have fun on the boat. Here is some of the fun we had on the boat, the Disney Wonder.

Poppa with Caden and Caroline as we waited to board.

Our room was larger than I expected. It was great for the four of us. The couch turned into a bed (for Caroline) and another came down from the ceiling above it (for me). Caden and Amy shared that big, comfy bed in the back of the room.

Despite the small size of the room, Caden and Caroline still enjoyed playing hide-n-seek in there.

Caden and Caroline loved hanging out in the top bunk.

Every night, we were surprised by a towel animal. This was our favorite of the bunch.

Caden and Caroline often enjoyed playing with the towel animals.

Caden loved exploring the boat and was more than happy to pose for a picture on the boat.

Caroline loved exploring as well. She specialized in climbing and sitting on random things.

 Of course, we played some shuffle board. Caden was very excited to play with us.

There was a lot of running around on the ship.

Here was one of the cool pools with a large, kids only slide.

Both kids went down the slide, but I only got a picture of Caroline. The loved the slide but did not enjoy the splash at the bottom.

One of the cool kid areas was called the Oceaneer Club. You could drop your kids off there while you went elsewhere. They only played there by themselves once. The rest of the time, I took them to open houses where the parents stayed and played. We went to an open house every day we were at sea.

The kids loved riding the Tick-Tock-Croc.

 Captain Caden

We wore the kids out every day. We'd be out doing something fun when they'd beg to go back to the room so they could go to sleep. :) That has never happened before.

There was a movie theater on board called the Buena Vista Theatre. We took the kids to their very first movie in this theater. We saw Planes. The kids definitely enjoyed their first movie.

Me with the kids with the Disney Wonder in the background.

In Cozumel, I did some walking around by myself. I bought Caroline this dress. She seemed to like it. I also bought Caden a funny from shirt with a moving mouth though we don't have a picture of that yet. :)

Since we were on a cruise ship, much of our time was spent eating. There were three main restaurants on the boat. We ate at a different one each night while our wait staff followed us around. This was different than any other cruise I've been on and was a lot of fun.

For one of our meals, the waiters created silly napkin hats for everyone. Mine even had a couple coffee mugs.

Amy showing off one of the menus. Each night had a new menu that fit the theme of the night and/or restaurant.

Amy ordered a dessert sampler. I never ordered a sampler. Instead, I always just ordered multiple full size desserts. :) Oh, and I also ordered two entrees at each dinner.

Caden's ketchup was always poured in the shape of a Mickey.

Caden ordered a bowl of ice cream with sprinkles every night. The first night, he took his straw and sucked up the melted ice cream. We let him since we were on a cruise. Our waiters thought this was hilarious and started brining Caden a straw with his ice cream. We saw this scene every single night.

Caroline ordered a chocolate covered Mickey most nights. (Actually, everyone but Poppa ordered one at some point on the trip.) Typically, she would have it all over her face before she finished it.

Amy, Caroline, and Caden posing with our waiters. They were great. The head waiter was from Jamaica while the assistant was from Turkey.

We had a ton of fun on our Disney cruise. So much so that Caden cried for an hour and a half when we got off and started driving home. He kept saying he wanted to go back to his boat. The kids eventually agreed that we'd take them again in ten days (they might be disappointed) but this time, Caroline wanted to take more toys.