Our CRUISE!

March 5-13, 2011

We left Saturday morning at about 9 o'clock. It was really hard for me to leave too :( As much as I've been looking forward to getting away, it was hard. My kids have never been without both me and Brenden at the same time, one of us have always been home. I knew Cole was going to have a really hard time, that made me sad. Brenden and I have NEVER been alone together since we started having kids. The most "alone" time we've gotten is when we go out to dinner, and that's usually with friends.

After saying goodbye to the kids, twice (because I forgot something and we had to go back to the house), we were finally on our way to California. It was a fun ride down, but six people in a mini van, well lets just say things got a little stinky. I think I was the only one who didn't fart, in the van anyways :)

After we rolled into Long Beach, we went over to visit the Queen Mary. It was pretty cool. We weren't there for long, because we wanted to get to Hollywood before it got too late. Do ya like the nice hats the boys found? No worries we didn't buy them :)

We were trying to get some funny pictures. We were standing in line for a roller coaster on the Sana Monica Pier, and the guy in front of us had some really {BAD B.O.} Ty leaned over to sniff him, and I nabbed this shot. On the right we have a picture of Ty and his future wife. He wanted to ask for her number, but chickened out ;)

On the walk back to the car we passed an arcade. This dude was on the dance mat game, and he was doin some serious dance moves! He was sweating {BIG TIME}! I think they were having some kind of dance off. His girlfriend was so proud of him, it was funny. She had a rag there for him, wiping the sweat off his forehead. Out side the arcade was this fun little jeep, Melinda, Annalee, and I all took turns riding with these ferocious animals ;)

Can I just say this was a {VERY INTERESTING} night! Six adults in one hotel room with two queen sized beds. I'm surprised nobody wet the bed, that was one funny night!

This was hilarious! Sunday morning before we got on the boat we went to breakfast. This Lady was sitting nearby. She seemed to be very energetic, she was eating fast and enjoying her meal. Then all of a sudden we looked over and she was sleeping, her face almost landed in her food. She'd get startled and be all energetic again and start eating fast, then she'd fall asleep again. {FUNNY STUFF}!

We were so glad we decided to get to the boat early on Sunday, because after we got registered and got our room key and got everything all squared away, we sat down to wait, and that line got {SUPPER DUPPER LONG}! While we were waiting to board the ship I called home. I knew I wasn't going to be able to call again for {TWO WHOLE DAYS} and I was starting to miss the kids again. Actually while my parents had the kids in church I called to leave a message on the answering machine that Cole could listen to for those couple days that I wasn't going to be able to call. Anyways I called my parents house, they had just gotten home from Church, Cole was screaming and running out the front door to go to our house :'( They finally caught him and I was able to talk to him, it helped him calm down to know I was still there and that his mommy didn't abandon him. My mom said he got a huge smile on his face when he was talking to me, or rather listening to me, I did most of the talking. I'm glad I could help, but it made me supper sad. I was having a hard time, and I started to cry :'( I was kinda emotional the whole trip. Anyways, this is us, we are finally on the ship, getting ready to start our two day trip to Mexico! This is our second day, Monday, aboard the Carnival Splendor. First of all I just gotta say that Ty is {HILARIOUS}! Okay, so this "waiter" guy came by and asked if we wanted a "drink". The sign said it was $7.50. He had a tray of cute little coconut monkeys that had a drink inside. We told him we needed a {VIRGIN} drink, he said it would be $1 cheaper. "Oh, so that's only $6.50?" He said "yes" We thought that was a pretty good deal. What seemed like an hour later, the dude finally brought us our drinks. They charge everything to your room key card, so he gave us our drinks then gave us a receipt to sign. I took my drink and started to drink it, then when he gave me the receipt, I just about did that thing where my drink sprayed out of my mouth. The drinks cost us over $16! {WHAT THE CRAP}! Thanks for making sure I drank before I signed, I should have sent it back anyways, but I'm a giant chicken. To make things even worst the dang drink tasted like throw up, {YUCK}!

Any questions? Me too :) Like I said, Ty is hilarious!

Every night we went to the dinning room to eat dinner. We had a set time to be there, sat at the same table, sat by the same annoying people, and had the same servers every night. I am so surprised that Ty and Curtis didn't deck anyone on the table right next to us. They were {ANNOYING}! Loud, bad language, and {VERY RUDE} to their parents! Enough about the rude table though, there are so many pictures I wish I would have taken, one is of our servers, Wan and Allie, oh and our Matradee, Miguel. They were so fun! Tuesday and Friday were the nights we got to dress up! So fun, I haven't had a reason to get to dress up for, well forever! The dinning room was so fancy too. I've never had so many forks for one meal :) They gave us each a menu, and you could order whatever you wanted, and I mean {WHATEVER}! I swear we each ordered at least two appetizers, two main courses and two desserts! We were {NEVER} hungry :) I think by the third or fourth night Wan knew exactly what Brenden was going to order, {STEAK}! When she got to Brenden, she would start out by saying, "Brenden. Steak, and...." We all thought that was pretty funny :)
{LAND HO}! Tuesday morning we went out to the front of the ship to be one of the first to spot land! Finally Mexico is in sight! Our first stop was Cabo San Lucus.

It seemed like forever before they finally let us off the ship. In Cabo their dock wasn't deep enough to dock a big cruse ship, so we had to get on little boats to get to land.

The first thing on our agenda was to do the "Land and Sea" tour. We got right back on a boat that took us on a tour, this is some of the cool stuff we saw. {GORGEOUS}! I love the blue water, it looked so crystal clear.

I look good with a tan, don't I :) Oh No, our ship is getting attacked by pirates!

This was the "Land" part of our tour. So so pretty!

We also stopped at the glass factory. It was amazing to watch this guy mold the melted pieces of glass into this awesome turtle, of course drinking Tequila. Everyone drinks Tequila in Mexico, well almost everyone. One of the locals said "don't drink the water, drink lots of Tequila instead"
A couple Mexican quotes I thought were funny "What can I do for you besides nothing" and "I can be your Mexican GPS"

Day two in Cabo we walked around and found the fire department of course. The guys thought it was pretty darn cool. One of the volunteers even showed them around the main area and let them look at everything.

After we were done at the Fire House, we walked around and did some shopping, that was my favorite part. I thought it was so funny how they would just stick to you like glue until you'd buy something. They make you feel like an important customer. One guy even came up to me and put a bracelet on me and said, "very beautiful, you must buy!" I liked bartering with them, it was fun to see how low they would go :)

What an awesome sunset!

Top left picture, Ty asked if he could try and throw this at me and ring me, I said to go ahead, until I felt how hard the dang thing was, that would have knocked me out! Bottom left, everyone thought that looked like Ty was going in for a smackeroonie!

Thursday we stopped in Port Vallarta, it was so pretty! We went on The Tequila Factory Tour. It was very interesting to see how Tequila is made. I had no idea it came from a cactus. The Cactus grows those huge pine cone looking things, they cut them up and make Tequila out of them. Very interesting, and boy did that place stink, smelled like a drunk......smelled like someone that was drunk, Tequila of course. That bottom picture is the cactus the pine cone comes from, and that circle is a lizard, they were everywhere. After the tour we were walking around and saw a couple in some trees. This one guy was eating lunch looking up holding his plate out acting like he was trying to catch one. He said it would make a good dinner :)

Group shots! We ate at one of the tour stops and had some tacos and quesadillas, There was this hot salsa there. Our tour guide Jose said it was 101 salsa, because they use 100 Jalapenos and 1 tomato. I tasted it, I think he was not lying, it was some {HOT STUFF}! I don't think I could feel my tongue for a couple hours, and I didn't even have very much.

There were a couple other statue people there too, I thought about getting my picture with one of them, until I saw one put his hand on a lady's boob, no thank you!

This little dude was hilarious! He stopped and let us take pictures with him, we should have tipped him, oh well.

There were some {AWESOME} sand sculptures on the beaches. I thought they were pretty {AMAZING}, very impressive if you ask me.

Guess what Brenden is going to be for Halloween this year! Nacho Libre!

We had one person in charge of taking care of our room, he would come in and make our bed, then at night he would turn down our bed, it was so {NICE}. Every night when we came back to our room and had our bed turned down we had a cute little towel animal waiting for us. I wish I would have taken pictures of all of them, they were so cute!

This is what Brenden was doing most of the time :)

Friday we set sail for home. After the tsunami hit Japan and was headed for California, our ship took a slight detour off route. By Saturday our ship was rocking pretty bad, but I thought it was fun. It was funny to watch people {TRY} to walk, I'm sure we all looked a little drunk! Oh, I almost forgot. I don't know which day it was, one of the first days I think. We went to the Kariokie bar, and the cruise worker that was there was {PEE YOUR PANTS} hilarious! If he wasn't gay, there was something seriously wrong with him. "W-O-W, WOW, that was fabulous!" I guess you had to be there, but O My Gosh! He {REALLY} enjoyed his job. He would do back up singing sometimes, and do some very pravocotive dancing. He really got into some of those songs. Seriously funny stuff :) I think that was one of our high lights!

I was so glad to get home on Sunday, until I walked into my house. My mom had locked the cats in the house for who knows how long, and all you could smell is cat poop! Yay, just what I wanted to do when I got home is clean up a {BUTT LOAD} of cat poo, yuck! When we went over to my parents to get the kids, they were so excited to see us! You couldn't wipe the smile off of Coles face for the rest of the day. I picked him up and he just layed on my shoulder forever! Jack made sure everything was packed and ready to go, he was ready to get home. It was an awesome trip! Sorry to those who went with us, I was a {little} grouchy. I was very emotional, mostly because I missed my kids, and a couple other reasons. But it was a good trip!