Cruise!

Dusty and I went on a cruise to the Caribbean earlier this month and it was such a blast! We sailed on Royal Caribbean's Freedom of the Seas and that ship was awesome! We went with Mont and Britt and 7 other couples that we had never met... kind of crazy but they were a lot fun and we all became friends pretty fast. Here we are at the beginning of our trip, just boarding the ship... wow, time went by to fast!



Room 1375, our home away home for the next week.



On Day 2 of our trip we were at port at Coco Cay (an island in the Bahamas), and we had decided that it was going to be a good old fashioned beach day. Before we got off the ship, while we were waiting for some of our group in the hallway, Dusty and Mont thought they would pass the time by tossing their frisbee back and forth. They were trying to get it over a housekeeping cart (mind you, the ceilings aren't very high) and Mont hit a light. It didn't do anything but Dusty looked into the surveillance camera and said, "Mont Lewis, Rm. 1377" - just goofing off of course. Well, Mont said he didn't think they could clear the cart without hitting the ceiling again and Dusty says, "I got this. Let me show you how it's done." He throws the frisbee and clears the cart BUT also hits the sprinkler... and sets it off.



Our hallway turned into a bit of chaos for awhile, they couldn't get the sprinkler turned off, it started to get more and more forceful, their was a fire retardant chemical in the water so the cruise staff was yelling at us to leave... So, we left and went to the island. Later that day, as we were getting back onto the ship Dusty and Mont were 'flagged' and sent to the security office (remember that security tape). They were treated a bit like criminals, I guess the upper management thought we ran off and said we were 'tampering' with a safety system, blah, blah, blah. It really didn't matter what we said, that it was an accident, that we tried to tell someone that it was our fault and were told to leave TWICE, that about 10 workers walked passed us as we were throwing the frisbee and none of them said it might not be a good idea because there are very fragile sprinklers in the ceiling... did I mention that the frisbee broke the sprinkler? Anyway, the lady in charge was still mad and very rude and we got slapped with a $150 fine each but... it was kind of all worth it because it was hilarious!



Here we are off on our first excursion to Coco Cay Island (this was after we set off the sprinkler but before we knew we were in trouble...) You can see a bit of our ship in the background.



Uh-oh, there's that naughty frisbee...



After our frisbee 'drama' the guys played poker for a little bit while the ladies got ready for formal night. Mont had about $75 of chips left and after dinner and the show we went back to our rooms to change and Mont can't find his chips. He and Britt are looking EVERYWHERE and they are nowhere to be found. He calls our room attendant to see if he took... I mean saw them in his room (I"m pretty sure he woke poor Marvin up because it was like 11:00 at night) and of course, Marvin hadn't seen them. We went down to the casino and talked to the casino manager, he talked to the dealer to see if Mont left them at the table - the answer was no - they said they would check the tapes... It was at least a 45 minute ordeal. Mont is not happy, this has been an expensive day for him after all with the FINE and everything. Well, we get back to our room and not two seconds later someone is rapidly knocking on our door. I open it and see Mont with a grin holding his 3 lost chips. Apparently he hadn't checked one pocket... Shesh!



The ship had two formal nights. Here are the guys looking very dapper. I wish I had a picture of all the girls but I don't. I was really bad at taking pictures.





The guys entered a Dodgeball tournament and they smoked the other teams! Well, until the end anyway. During their first two games they were invincible, none of our guys were even hit by a ball but then that last game... I don't know what happened but we lost. I blame Bubba. He didn't play in the last game (we had to many guys so they had to rotate) so we didn't have his speedo clad body to distract the other players. We still took second and all the guys got silver medals.






Bubba's at it again. He and Troy sang "Summer Lov'in" (from Grease) at karaoke night. Guess who sang Sandy's part?



Troy was being very sneaky and signed up all us ladies for a song. So we got up and sang "Dancing Queen". I'm really not the karaoke type but it was fun when you're in a group. Of course Bubba joined us, since he was being a 'lady' that night. They even gave him back the pink tutu halfway through the song.



One of our stops was at St. Thomas. We had signed up to go snorkeling at Turtle Bay and we had to sail on a 'pirate' boat to get there. This is at the beginning of our trip, look how happy I am. I had no idea what was to come...



The water was REALLY wavy, and the boat had to go so slow, it took almost an hour to get to Turtle Bay. I almost made it but not quite... yep, I threw up... in an orange bucket. We were all in a hurry to get off the boat and into the water because then we would feel better right? Nope. We all got sick in the water too. After seeing some turtles and fish I got out because I was feeling totally sick again, Dusty about lost it and poor Brittany and Kristi threw up while they were in the ocean... imagine how that works with the waves pushing everything back at you... I think I'm grateful for my bucket!



After our miserable snorkeling experience, we decided that at St. Maarten the next day all we wanted to do was lay down-on solid ground-at the beach, and just relax. Here we are taking a ferry to their downtown beach, which we weren't thrilled with, so we hailed a taxi to take us to "St. Maarten's Best Kept Secret" Sunset Beach - If you've read my previous post about the airplanes you know how well that turned out for us...



Is that a picture of me behind the airplane?



Awww, just having a great time at the beach. Little did I know I was in for the exfoliation of my life! (If you don't know what I'm talking about, read my Sun, Sand and Airplanes post... it's a long story)



We loved Johnny Rocket's! I think we ate there everyday. Just looking at this picture is making me crave a chocolate malt.



Our last two days on the ship were 'at sea' and the weather wasn't great. It was chilly and windy. So, we didn't do any of the fun stuff like the Flow Rider, or the Rock Wall, or miniature golf, or laying out by the pool (we tried, but you don't get much of a tan when you're in a hoodie and pants...) but there were other things to do. The guys had a great time playing poker. Brandon taught them how to play craps and Mont was the luckiest roller ever. He rolled the dice for like an hour straight and won everybody a lot of money. Who-hoo! We won back our 'fine' money and then some!




Mont had lost a bet with us before the trip, (we play card games and instead of money we have a bet, and the loser has to own up) and he had to parade down the Promenade in a speedo that Dusty and I picked out. It was seriously one of the funniest things I have ever seen -just because there were so many people around and he got so much attention. It's a long story too, I posted it in detail earlier in the month. Let's just say he was quite a hit. (He had actually lost two bets. He also had to sing Happy Birthday in his best crooner voice during dinner. It was good, unfortunately we didn't get any pics or video of it)


We introduced the Saratoga Springs gang (those are the couples we were with) to our way of playing cards. Sweet little Krisi lost and had to stand up in the middle of dinner on the last night and yell, "I LOVE BEING ON A CRUISE AND I DON'T WANT TO GO HOME!" It was so funny, she is very much not the kind of person who would do something like this. I think her husband was more embarrassed than she was though. Look at him with a napkin over his face... way to be supportive J.D.!



We all had a great time together. Here's a couple of pics of the girls. As you can see, we can't even be serious long enough to take a picture...



We went dancing almost every night. It was soooo much fun and a great way to work off all those calories we had eaten during the day... did I mention that we loved Johnny Rockets?




When you're on a cruise that is a bit cold and windy you spend a lot of time in the hot tub.




One of our favorite things to do after all the festivities of the night was to go down to the promenade and eat cookies and chocolate milk... and sometimes pizza... at like, 2:00 in the morning. Good thing we had gone dancing.



After our cruise was over{sniffle}, we had some time to kill before our flights so we hung out at Downtown Disney. We were all so tired that we went to the movie just so we could sit in a somewhat comfy seat, in the dark, and take a nap. I'm sure it looked pretty weird for 18 people to all be asleep during the show. I hope nobody snored. We also walked around a bit and Kaden is obsessed with the Wii Indiana Jones Lego game so we had to take a picture by Indiana Jones himself.



We went in the Harley Davidson store and Britt and I were trying to look like cool biker chics but we ended up just looking like Beevis and Butthead instead... Uh huh huh huh. Fire! Fire!



While it's nice to 'get away' and we had a FABULOUS time on the cruise, it's also really nice to come home too. It's pretty easy to leave 'paradise' when you have your 4 favorite people in the world waiting at home for you, and you really can't wait to see them. Thanks to all our various family members who took great care of our kids while we are gone, it's easier to relax and have a good time knowing your kids are in good hands. And thanks to our kids for making us some special 'Welcome Home' pictures! We love you!

Happy St. Patty's Day!

Ever since I was little, the leprechauns have been visiting my house on St. Patrick's Day eve and magically turning all the sugar in our sugar bowl into candy. It's nice to know that even though I'm all grown up they have continued on with the tradition for my kids as well. Breckyn and Kaden were so excited, they have been asking me for over a week if it's the night the 'lepercans' are coming, so last night when the time was finally here they made sure that our sugar bowl was filled to the brim (they can make more candy that way).

Kaden said they were using their "magic" to turn the sugar into candy. Also, I promise my kids do actually have a drawer full of cute PJ's but for some reason Kade likes to wear ONLY bottoms and Breckyn has an addiction to her Dad's T-shirts...



Those sneaky little Leprechauns not only left us a nice stash of candy but they turned our milk green! (Which the kids thought was hilarious)



My crazy little munchkins... plus 1 cousin. The little ones ran around all afternoon trying to find the Leprechuans.




I came across this cute little Irish saying:
“May your thoughts be as glad as the shamrocks. May your heart be as light as a song. May each day bring you bright, happy hours. That stay with you all the year long.”
Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Sun, Sand and...AIrplanes? Oh my!

The day we stopped at St. Maarten we really just wanted some good, relaxing beach time, so Mont did a little google search and located "St. Maarten's best kept secret" Sunset Beach. That's pretty much all we had to go on but we thought, hey let's try it. We located a taxi driver who-after some discussion-figured out where we wanted to go, and we started off on our journey. After a looong, 45 minute drive through I think every town in St. Maarten we drive up to the beach greeted by this sign:

And then a big ole airplane flew right over us and landed. The beach is literally directly behind the airport landing strip. Dusty and Mont had huge grins and could hardly contain their excitement while Britt and I were like, "I don't think so(Z snap)" and asked our driver if there was another beach close by. Of course not! The next beach is another 45 minutes away. So, to the boys delight we stayed at Airport... oh, I mean, Sunset Beach. We set up our stuff in the only uncrowded part of the beach and started to soak up the sun. A very nice lady then came over and told us that we were directly in the line of fire when the planes take off (which would explain why no one else was set up there) and that we and all of our stuff would get blown down the beach into the water So we picked up and moved over to the side. A little while later we were all hanging out in the water when we heard a jet plane moving onto the runway getting ready to take off. We looked at the guys and told them to hurry and go move our stuff over some more just in case it might still be in the way. For some reason we were just concerned about what was on the beach, Britt and I weren't thinking of what happens in the water when the plane takes off... So, anyway, we are just hanging out in the water, waiting for the plane to take off, when a great big wave comes into the shore and just takes Brittany down. It rolled her around a bit and when she finally popped up we were so caught up in the hilarity of the moment that we completely forgot about the plane. Apparently Dusty and Mont were yelling at us to get out of the water but we couldn't hear them over our laughing and the plane's engine. So, while Britt and I are in the middle of giggling about the wave we are completely slammed, and I mean SLAMMED, with sand. I have to admit that I felt a little bit panicked. You couldn't see and you really couldn't move and it HURT! Britt just kept grabbing onto me which was making me more nervous because I was like, "Is she okay? Is she drowning?"(she really just didn't want us to get separated). We tried to swim out of the way but that was impossible. Britt definitely was thinking more than I was because she kept going under water so that the sand wasn't hitting her while I kept my head above the water the whole time... I had some really cute sunglasses that I didn't want to lose... When it was finally over and Britt surfaced she got a kick out of my sandblasted face. There was like an inch of sand covering all my hair and the side of my face. I really wish we would have taken a picture. Anyway, here is the video the guys took of the plane taking off and you get a little glimpse of Britt and I in the water getting pummeled by the sand. And just as a side note, I lost my glasses. Boo.

My favorite bet loss ever!

Our cruise was very eventful and we have plenty of stories to share so I think I'm going to have to post it in installments. This first video has got to be my favorite bet loss ever. We were playing cards with Britt and Mont a couple of weeks ago and since we don't play with money we always have a bet attached to the game. The loser has to own up on the bet. This bet was that the loser had to wear a swimsuit of our (the other players) choice while playing miniature golf on our upcoming cruise. Well, Mont was the lucky loser so he had a few weeks to dread the event while Dusty and I had a great time shopping for the lamest speedo we could find. On our cruise the weather was not cooperating, it was cold and windy on our days at sea, so instead of playing golf, Mont got to strut his stuff down the promenade of the ship. The promenade is like the "mall" part of the ship, so everyone is pretty much in normal clothes, no swimsuits, which made Mont stand out even more. It was hilarious! SOOO much better than golf would have been! He was quite the spectacle. Everyone was staring and laughing and I think one group asked him if he'd had too much to drink already. You'll see him pass some older ladies getting a make-over and Brittany heard one of them say, "I think he looks cute in his little swimsuit." I think this may have backfired though because Mont seemed to get pretty comfortable in that speedo. I sure hope he doesn't show up in it the next time we take them to Bear Lake!

Sorry! If you didn't get to see the video it's too late now. But here's a picture.