Back Home and Gone Again

We took the kids on a Christmas Cruise.  It left on December 26th and we just got back home this morning.  The kids had so much fun, especially on this waterfall jumping trip we took in the Dominican Republic.  We all came back a little bloody and bruised, but WOW was it a lot of fun.  One of those once in a lifetime experiences that you are so glad you tried but never want to do again.  Kurt's brother and his family came along with us, so it was a nice chance to spend some time together.    

Unfortunately, while we were gone, be got a message letting us know that Kurt's mom had passed away.  She has been fighting lung cancer for the last couple of years, and had been in a lot of pain for several months now.  It is a relief to know that she isn't suffering anymore, but it was still a shock for everyone.  We are home for just enough time to do laundry and pack again.  Then we will head up to North Carolina to spend some time with Kurt's dad and visit with family who are coming for the Celebration of Life that she wanted to have instead of a funeral.
I have plenty of handwork ready for the car trip.  Maybe I will finally catch up on the 366 circles for my Leap Year quilt?  I'll set up next weeks ScrapHappy Saturday before we hit the road.  Hopefully I'll be able to check in with everyone when we are home again for good.  

Post Cruise Recovery

 We are finally home again after our 7 day cruise!  There was quite a bit of time for slow stitching on the drive to the cruise port in Miami and while hanging out on the deck listening to an audio book and waiting for the kids to check in between activities.   Having everything prepped made it all very easy to stitch at a leisurely pace.  So these are my blue blocks so far.  I think I'll group them into 4s, I'll still need to trim them down a bit before sewing them together, but they look pretty happy so far.  I don't feel the need to make any grand sashing decisions yet, this one will go on all year.  Head over to Kathy's Quilts to see what other slow stitching is going on during this day of rest.

 So I can't leave without a few pictures from the cruise.  Here are the girls taking a chair lift to the beach at Mahogany Bay on Isla Roatan, off of the coast of Honduras.  It was only a 5 minute walk, but they liked the lift anyway.

 They got their hair braided, which I guess is part of the plan on a Caribbean cruise.  Ryan skipped that part of the fun.

They chose to snorkel with the stingrays in Grand Cayman.  They were so tired on the boat trip back that everyone fell asleep except Anna.  We also visited Belize and Cozumel.  We did snorkeling at Chakanaab in Cozumel and went cave tubing in Belize.  Thankfully there were also two days at sea for everyone to recover.  Staying up late for the comedians and the evening shows put us all off of our normal early to rise routine.  It feels great to be home again despite all the fun of vacation.  Laundry is underway, everything else can wait a while.  Tuesday is back to school for everyone. I have 289 e-mails to sort through, so please forgive me if I haven't responded back to your comments yet.  I'll try to get through them today at some point.   

Guess Where We Went?

We tried to keep the cruise as a surprise for the kids.  In the process we hardly mentioned it to anyone.  We are home again though, and if there is anything better than going away on a cruise, it is getting back home again.  It was just a short cruise to the Bahamas.  We left New Year's Day and stopped in Freeport and Nassau before heading home again. 
A cold front moved through while we were away.  We felt it come in on the boat.  It was so windy when we landed in Nassau that we broke two docking cables as well as a tug boat and ended up bumping into the dock where we busted off at least three of the posts that were supposed to be holding us in place.  It was almost exciting in a very slow motion/wonder what is happening kind of way.  Other than that, it was a very calm trip.  The kids loved eating in the fancy restaurant each night and getting pizza and ice cream 24/7.  They bounced in and out of the planned activities leaving Kurt and I with a few pieces of quiet time. 
I'm not sure what to do now that we're all back again.  Tomorrow is a work day, but I could spend a few minutes sewing before then I think.  I suppose I should think about unpacking, but right now I'm sitting under a quilt waiting for the heater to warm things up a bit.  Maybe I'll just check out a few blogs and see how everyone else started the new year. 

Vacation Recovery

Warning --obligitory post vacation post -- feel free to skip or skim.
The first day of our cruise was a day at sea. It wasn't hot, but we were happy enough to lounge by the pool with books and enjoy the shipboard activities. The jogging track was quite nice and the spa was beautiful. There was a very lavish pool for adults only with cushy lounge chairs and lots of hot tubs as well. We found an Irish Pub after dinner that had a sing-a-long guitar player who specialized in drinking songs.
Our first port of call was Labadee. People always called it Labadee, and tried to pretend that it wasn't in Haiti. Before we left, the kids kept asking if we were going to Haiti why we weren't going to help those people build houses. They didn't quite understand that it wasn't that part of Haiti. It is a very different part though. Not quite and island, but a very isolate peninsula with a big mountain and wall separating it from the rest of Haiti. The cruise line did spend the whole day unloading relief supplies from the ship, so that part helped assuage the guilt of vacationing in a disaster zone.
Labadee was unscathed by the earthquakes. I guess it is hard to damage beaches and waterparks. Just about the time we docked and cleared for debarkation, the rain started to role in. It lasted until it was time to leave, varying in strength from drizzle to downpour. Obviously not a beach day, but we took a rambling hike through the rain and enjoyed the views. The area was absolutely beautiful, and it would have been a great place to lounge and soak in a little sun if the weather had been more agreeable.
Jamaica was after that, and we didn't even get off the boat. We've been to Jamaica before and done the main attraction, which is Dun's River falls. It was spectacular, but we didn't really want to do it again. Not being much into shopping or haggling, we decided to enjoy the lovely, mostly empty, ship for the day.
We splurged on a balcony room for the first time and enjoyed sitting out and enjoying the fresh air. I'm sure we would have spent more time out there if it had been just a little bit warmer, but it was nice to have the sun. The shows were good, especially the ice skating which included a really unusual routine with hula hoops and a black light. There was an excellent ventriloquist as well as a magician and comedian. The obligatory dancer/singers were there as well, with two big musical numbers. We had the late seating for dinner and ate way too much as most people seem to do on a cruise. I took advantage of the movie theater a couple of times, but there were lots of things we just didn't do -- karaoke, disco, street parties and parades. Something for everyone for sure.

I think I mentioned that the kids were happy to have us home again. Sydney lost her second tooth -- isn't she cute? They are at school today, leaving me home to enjoy solitude and my sewing machine. At some point I should think about preparing for school next week, but for now I've got plenty of time to enjoy just being back again. I've got another BOM from Amy finished off and just shopped the stash for some more fabric to add to my collection so that I can finish off the last block for February. I'll do pictures of those "l8r" so check back for quilt related pictures tonight.

Back Home Now

We are just back from our cruise. I've managed to get some laundry done, but that is about all so far. My in-laws are still here until tomorrow, so another day until I can settle back into my bedroom and unpack.
The cruise was great. Not fabulous weather unfortunately, but very relaxing. I'll do the full rundown tomorrow after I get the few pictures off our camera, but for now, here is a towel monkey just like the one that was in our stateroom yesterday. It is always hard to readust to real life after a vacation. There is nobody here to turn my towel into an armadillo or an elephant, nobody bringing extra desserts "just in case", nobody trying to convince me to order an extra entree at diner or delivering a daily list of activities to my room every evening. Still, there were no big hugs out there on the big blue ocean or little toothless grins telling me how good it is to have me home again. The kids all seemed to do very well while we were gone, though they were all happy to see us again. Kurt did spend the last two days of the vacation mentioning how much "Anna would love the ice show" or "Ryan would get a kick out of the magician". I think 5 days was a little longer than he wanted to be away from home. I was happy to be gone, but just as happy to be home again. I'm not happy with the way my jeans fit, but I guess I guess that is the price I must pay for all the "free" food.

Home Again

We are back, rested, tanned and 5 pound heavier, from our cruise. We had a lovely time doing not too much of anything at all for 4 days. The kids all got along great at home with Nana and did not seem disturbed at all by our departure. We were scheduled for two stops, one on the Royal Caribbean private island which is called Cocoa Cay, and one at Nassau in the Bahamas. We've been to Nassau a couple of times already and didn't really have any plans there, but were very much looking forward to the private island, which was one of our favorite parts of an earlier cruise. The seas were too rough for tender service on the first scheduled stop, but we were able to rearrange our schedule and make it through on the way home. Most of the Royal Caribbean boats have rock climbing walls, so we made sure to try that out. I've actually been quite a bit recently, but Kurt hasn't been in ages and was a little rusty. Other than that, I read a couple of books, enjoyed the movie matinee and watched the evening shows. We even managed to stay up for the midnight comedian on the second night! It was way past our usual bedtime, but lots of fun.
Dinner each evening was our favorite part of the trip. I know everyone eats way too much on cruises, but it is such a luxury for parents to sit through a nice long meal with no spilt milk, without having to fetch anything from the kitchen, and then have someone clear away all the dishes and whisk them out of site. Pure bliss!!

No cruise would be complete without towel animals, we had a monkey, and elephant and a stingray. The kids all got such a kick out of the towels on our last cruise that they even went to the class and practiced folding them when we got home. I gave them a lesson on the stingray when we got back and they were all very impressed.

We got back home yesterday morning and Kurt rushed off to work, trying to get everything ready for customers who are in town next week. His mother had saved a flier from the paper advertising a local quilt show, which she thought we could go to together. What a sweet idea! She's not even a quilter, but thought I might like it. I took lots of pictures, which I'll share tomorrow, and bought just a couple of things. One was called a "Moda Bake Shop". Has anyone seen those yet? They are highly adorable -- just like little mini jelly rolls. Instead of being 2.5 inch strips, they are 1.5 inches, and just so completely adorable. I thought I'd make up more tiny little 9 patches for some doll quilts. They also had scrap bags for $1 each, so I picked up a few of those. It is so much fun to play with other peoples scraps! I ironed them last night while dinner was cooking and started cutting dishing them out into the square drawers. Several of the fabrics were from quilts I had seen at the show. I'm focusing on 2 inch squares right now for my Irish Chain. It's coming along nicely, I'd better do the math so I know when to stop.
Today brought a return to the usual weekend fare. Kurt drove his Mom back to the airport while I took Anna to Ice Skating. I paired my little two inch squares peacefully while she practiced. When we got home she wanted to sew a pair of guards for the blades of her ice skates. We whipped up a pair of those and finished up just as the rest of the gang got back from their trip. Kurt is off puttering in the yard now, and Anna has volunteered to wash my car. Sydney wants to go see Coraline this afternoon and Ryan is finding a friend to play with. The cruise was a beautiful departure from reality, but being back to reality it pretty good too. I hope everyone had a great time this week. I'll check in on everyone after our movie.