Easter

Today was such a long day.  Last night Mike and I were up until midnight packing.  I woke up at about 3:30 in the morning.  I couldn't get back to sleep.  I just lay in bed and watched as Florida sailed on by. It was really pretty and I am so thankful that my back didn't hurt the rest of the day.  Usually if I don't get up right away I hurt all day long.

We had a few eggs hidden in our cabin for the kids to find.  We woke them up, let them find their eggs and then hurried off to breakfast.  Not the most spiritual way to spend Easter, but it is what it is.

Preston

Jorja

 Maysen

 Stockton

Our scheduled time to get off the boat was 9:00.  Everything went really smoothly, thank goodness.  We took a bus to the Fort Lauderdale airport.  Then we waited.  We waited, and waited, and waited.  I think we had a five hour wait.  I wish there were plugs by the seats like there are in the Salt Lake airport.  That would have been nice.  I did find one plug and stood by it why Mike went and grabbed Preston's ds.  A lady came and was a little upset with me for claiming the plug.  She said, "I saw it and I went to get my things."  I just smiled at her and said I was only using one of the two outlets.  Luckily Mike was quick and we were able to get his ds charged for the trip home.

We travelled to Atlanta, Georgia.  It was such a weird feeling flying into Georgia.  I wish we could have stayed there for just a bit.  There are so many things I love about that place.  

We got to Salt Lake about 11:30 at night.  My dad was waiting for us, that was nice.  When we finally stumbled into our house I just let the kids crawl into their beds wearing their clothes.  They have school tomorrow.  Today was such a long day, after a wonderful week.

Looking back I don't think I would book a cruise on Norwegian again. We had a great trip, but there were several minor things that I didn't like.  I guess after traveling with Disney and Royal Caribbean I expected to be blown away with the awesomeness.  I wasn't.  There were definitely some things I did enjoy.  It was nice to be able to have dinner with just my family at the table.  Or Mike.  One of the minor things I didn't like was there drink policy.  We don't drink a lot of pop, so we didn't want to pay for the $60 unlimited drink card.  We figured if the kids wanted pop they could get it at dinner.  (Stockton is really the only one who likes it, maybe Preston.  Definitely not Maysen and Jorja.)   You couldn't order pop at dinner unless you paid for it.  Then we saw the drinks being poured out of 2 liter soda bottles.  That's crazy!  At least the milk was free at dinners.  Oh, and hot chocolate was.  They would bring the hot chocolate in a little pot so you could pour your own refills - that was cool.  I don't know why they are so stingy on soda.  Anyway, I guess I felt in several instances we were being 'nickled and dimed'. After paying so much for the cruise in the first place, I did not want to feel that way.  There were two dining rooms you could eat that were referred to as the 'complementary' dining rooms.  There were five or six dining rooms that you had to pay to eat there - around $25/person.  No way was I going to pay for food when we already paid.  That was what confused me about the complementary term.  We already paid for this. Anyway, I heard the really good food was in the other restaurants. That's okay, we ate and ate and ate just fine.

Go Stomach, Go!

Preston

Today was our last full day on the boat, and it was a sea day.  Too bad it was super windy and cold.  We have had bad, bad luck with the weather this trip.  Oh well, we still had a lot of fun.  This morning we made our way up to the rock climbing wall.  It is not always open, and it was something I had really wanted to do – so I wanted to get there as soon as it opened.  I figured it would be really crowded today.  Too bad it was closed because of the weather.  It was really windy.  So, we played checkers instead.  Maysen played against Preston and I.  She defeated us soundly.

We then waited in our cabin – reading and watching movies.  Mike was able to take a super long nap.  I wanted to go to was the towel folding demonstration, Jorja was looking forward to that.  We went up for lunch, lost track of time and missed the demonstration!  Whoops. 

The next thing we wanted to do was see Chip Romero again.  He was in a smaller lounge we had never been to.  We should have thought farther ahead.  We weren’t able to get a good seat.  The show was still funny and amazing, it just would have been nice if we could have seen it better.  Jorja and Preston were in the play area during the show.  They were supposed to do an egg drop.  We picked up Jorja after the show.  She was disappointed because they didn’t do the egg drop.  That is the reason she missed the show.  We picked up Preston later and he was crying.  I think his group got to do the egg drop, but he didn’t get a turn to try.  I’m not really sure.

We took the kids to the fancy dinner tonight.  They did really great again.  Stockton was so full after his pizza.  He had ordered ice cream and was getting nervous that he wouldn’t be able to eat it.  He started pounding his stomach and said, “Go stomach, go!”  So funny!  I took a lot of pictures at dinner.  It is hard to get the kids to cooperate for pictures.  We compromise, instead of taking one quick picture and putting the camera away, I take a lot of pictures and put all of them on the blog.  Preston was at dinner too, but I'm not even going to bother with his pictures today.  

 Mike - I wonder where the kids learned their picture taking skills?

 Mike - thank you.

 Stockton

 Maysen

 Jorja

 Stockton

The show the kids wanted to see tonight was in the same lounge where the magic show was.  We decided not to make the same mistake again.  We got there about an hour and a half early.  We got a front row seat!  We were the only ones in there for a long time.  It was pretty fun.  The kids were watching a movie on Mike’s lap top.  Mike and I played many games of Speed.  Once the music started playing, Jorja did not like it at all.  Jorja and I went and laid down on the bed at the back of the room.  Jorja loved that! 

Stockton, Maysen, Preston, Jorja

 This gizmo makes me happy.

 Jorja loved this bed!

The show was a Second City Improv show.  The kids thought it was so funny.  They used a suggestion from both Maysen and Stockton.  They have been making up their own jokes all night.  We didn't get a towel animal tonight.  Not sure why, the kids were disappointed.  Maybe it was because I missed the towel folding demonstration.

Cozumel

Today was my first time ever in Mexico.  The weather was again overcast, but we had a great day anyway.  The kids picked the excursion for today.  This was their reward for reading the Book of Mormon in a few months last year.  They were excited about the water trampolines.  As soon as we got to the beach we headed for those trampolines – just in case the weather closed those as well!  We left our camera back on the ship which was so disappointing!  We played on those trampolines for about an hour and a half.  Mike and Jorja also rode a kayak and paddleboat.  We had hoped to go parasailing.  Originally we hoped to do it at Great Stirrup Cay, but it was closed because of bad weather.  This place also offered it, but again, closed because of bad weather.  Up the beach they were running the parasails, so we walked to a different beach and were able to get signed up.  Luckily we had just enough money to do it.  Preston did not want to go.  Stockton was trying to bribe him.  I told them that if he didn’t want to go I wasn’t going to make him.  Jorja said, “You made me get my toenails painted!”  I’m thinking, “Yes, having a 10 year old girl paint her toenails and forcing a 6 year old boy to parasail are exactly the same thing.”  Speaking of Jorja’s toenails, she is quite ridiculous.  Whenever her shoes are off she walks with her toes curled so no one will see her toenails.  Whatever.

Anyway, we got on the boat with a few other families.  Maysen, Stockton and Jorja went first.  I couldn’t believe it when I saw them get pulled up in the air.  There went my babies!  This nice lady heard me say, “I can’t believe I don’t have my camera!”  She took pictures of them for me and said she will email them to me.  I hope she does!  When Preston saw the kids up in the air, he decided he wanted to try it.  They were in the air about fifteen minutes.  They came back so happy!  Stockton said he almost threw up.  Now that would have been a sight!

My babies!  Stockton, Jorja, Maysen

 My guess is they had fun.

Mike, Preston and I went up next.  Preston LOVED it!  He wasn’t scared at all!  I was so proud of him.  This was my first time parasailing.  It was so pretty!  The water was two different colors of blue.  It’s weird because when you are on the boat it seems like you are going so fast, but when you are up in the air it barely seems like you are moving.  By the end of our fifteen minutes Preston was holding his hands out like he was flying.  So cute!

Mike, Preston, Stephanie taking off

 Coming back - Preston LOVED it!  So glad he decided to go!

When we got back to shore we realized we only had twenty minutes until our bus left.  We ran down the beach and made it back just in time.  Too bad we didn’t get to do any of the other stuff that was included in our excursion, especially the water slides.  Stockton really wanted to do that.   We all agreed that it would have been fun, but at least we got to do the parasailing.  We could do water slides at home.

Again for the show tonight we sent Preston to the kid area and we watched the show with the others.  This time it was amazing!  We watched a magician named Chip Romero.  The kids loved it and were laughing through most of the show.  Thank goodness!  It was absolutely wonderful!

Mike, Stockton, Maysen, Jorja

 Jorja, Stephanie

Cayman Islands

We had bad luck today.  Our excursion for the day was this pirate boat thing.  We were going to ride this pirate looking ship.  The kids would be pirates.  They would swab the deck, tie up one of the dads and finish by walking the plank (jumping into the ocean).  The reviews said it was cheesy but a lot of fun.  Stockton and Mike were looking forward to this.  Stockton had asked me many times which day we get to do the pirate ship.  Our excursion wasn’t until 2:00.  That was kind of a bummer because it wasn’t going to be super long, but it didn’t leave us any time to do something else before or after.  We ended up getting off the boat around 11:00.  We decided to let the kids wander some shops to pick up a souvenir.  Stockton did not enjoy this part of our trip.  When it was finally time for our excursion we made our way back to the dock where we were supposed to meet.  The only problem was no one was there except a few other families and whispers about our excursion being cancelled.  I waited with the kids while Mike tried to figure out what was going on.  It took about 45 minutes before we got conformation that our trip had been cancelled.

Later we were told that the guy who runs the pirate ship cancelled the excursion around 11:30.  They made an announcement, but we were off the ship at that time.  I wouldn’t be annoyed with Norwegian if I thought they had done everything they could.  At minimum they could have had a sign saying the excursion was cancelled.  They should have had a person there letting us know it was cancelled.  The poor security guard kept calling the boat to find out what was going on, no one was even at the excursion desk.  I’m disappointed because who knows if we will ever come back to this island again.  We could have easily gone to the turtle farm, which three of my four kids would have loved.  Anyway, quite disappointed in the service we got today.

Mike 

On the plus side, the girls got some stinking cute hats.  They will love them by our pool this summer.  Stockton got a ball that is supposed to skip on water.  Again, that will be fun for him in the pool.  Preston got a light up fan that says LOVE.  Too bad he broke it before he went to bed.  New record.

 Maysen

Jorja

Preston

We did get to go bowling today.  We wanted to do it at least once.  Bowling is $5/person.  Luckily we were able to get in on the 2 for 1 deal.  I did horrible!  It is hard to bowl on a ship!  Stockton won.  He was very happy about that.  I tried to take pictures, but most of them turned out blurry.  Oh well, they can't all be winners.

 Mike

 Jorja

 Maysen

 Preston

 Stockton

 Stockton's Strike Dance

 Maysen's annoyed that I kept making her do the Strike Dance

 Preston and Stockton

 Final Score

Stockton's proud

This evening Preston went to play in the kids area (and LOVED it!)  We went with the kids to the show that was supposed to be amazing.  We had really close seats.  There was supposed to be singing, dancing, trapeze stuff, acrobatics, contortionists . . . . It sounded really cool.  I was imagining some circus thing.  If I had realized what the show was I definitely wouldn’t have brought my kids to it.  I doubt I would have chosen to sit through the show myself.  It was Donovan and Rebecca.  They have been on America’s Got Talent and hold three world records.  Maybe the show wouldn’t have been so bad if we weren’t sitting so close.  But the skimpy costumes, the seductive walking, the awkward poses – they all made me extremely uncomfortable with my kids sitting right beside me.  I wish we could have made an inconspicuous exit, but that was impossible.  As soon as the show was over I leaned over to the kids and whispered, “You deserve ice cream for sitting through that.”  Thank goodness Preston didn’t come with us!

Preston spent his time playing pirates.  They even went on a pirate parade and a treasure hunt.  I found Preston as he was walking through the ship with his kids group.  I held his hand and went on the rest of the parade with him.  Stinky Pete stole the treasure.  They found him out by the pool and pushed him in.  I was glad I was there.  I held Preston so he could see, and also so he wasn’t trampled by everyone.  I felt like I was going to be trampled.  Preston was able to pick a prize from the treasure chest.  He picked a necklace.  He wouldn’t let us wash off his face paint tonight.  He loved it.

Preston trying to wink to show off his eye patch face paint

 Preston

 Hamster