Enjoying the Christmas gifts

Analese really enjoys the easel that she got for Christmas from her Meemee. She was being very creative and painting yesterday.




The girls both love the dollhouse that came from Lee's aunt and uncle. Lee's aunt won the dollhouse at the fair, and we somehow got it home from Thanksgiving without the girls really noticing. We made sure they got some furniture for it.

Christmas 2010

Christmas this year was a lovely, simple affair at home. My birthday on Christmas Eve was nice and relaxing. Lee's Dad spent Christmas with us. We did a Christmas Eve pool party with friends, followed by a few presents.



We did presents at our house on Christmas morning. The girls are close enough in age that they really dig each other's gifts. It's nice that way, actually.




I love this picture because of Mariele's little footsies.



My little "chefs in training."

Crossed the finish line!

I started off the year with the lofty goal of walking/running 500 miles in 2010. Well, approximately 20 minutes ago I met my goal! And I finished by doing just what I want to do more of in 2011 - pounding the pavement. Yes, the pavement and not the treadmill platform. I will still do plenty of treadmilling, I am sure. But I really want to build up my tolerance for running outdoors. The weather here has been just lovely for outdoor runs this week, so I have been putting the girls into the double BOB and taking off through the neighborhoods and trails. Running outdoors must definitely be more of a gluteal workout that the smooth suspension treadmill, because I can feel it! Plus, I should probably get bonus miles for pushing the stroller. OK, I'm just kidding there ; ) Yay, me! Looking forward to even more miles in 2011 (plus some strength training).

Jamaica and the last two days at sea

On Thursday the ship docked in Jamaica. We took a tour to Negril to go to the beach. We were so ready for some beach time after having been shafted on beach time in Grand Cayman. The bus ride into Negril took about an hour and a half, but we really got to see a lot of Jamaica on the way over. The beach was beautiful and the weather was perfect.



Our tour gude braided Analese's hair on the bus on the way back to the ship. I just took the braids out tonight after she wore them for 8 days! It was really fun for her to have the braids.



After sailing away from Jamaica, we enjoyed two entire days at sea before returning to Galveston. Lee and I enjoyed ice-skating on the ship. I could not convince Analese to join us, even though I tried to bribe her with a coconut mango smoothie. We put on a show for her instead.



Lee and I dressed up one night for formal dinner. Mom dressed the girls in their Christmas dresses while we were gone, then we tried to get a Christmas picture. The lighting was not the best, so this was the best we were able to get.



Our last evening at sea was incredibly rocky. I forgot to mention that both girls got seasick our first morning at sea. They were fine the rest of the week, but the last evening was very wavy. We sailed right into a cold front and the sea was quite dramatic. The wind was very strong too. They had to close the outside decks later that night.



Sunday after we arrived back home, I was so dizzy! My house was completely rocking. Mariele was having the same equilibrium problem. She kept falling. She hit her head and busted her lip. Lee would not let her on the stairs by herself because it was dangerous with her lack of equilibrium. It was the strangest feeling for me to have "land-sickness." Luckily it only lasted a couple of days. I think I finally have my land legs back. We had a fabulous cruise. It was certainly a nice way to kick off the Christmas holidays.

Grand Cayman

On Wednesday we arrived off the coast of Grand Cayman. There is no place for the ship to dock there, so the anchor was dropped and they sent little ferry boats back and forth from the ship to the island. Here we are on the little boat called a tender.




That is another cruise ship in the background behind Analese. We got a great photo of our cruise ship from the tender boat.



We took a tour of the mangrove forest and got to see these neat tunicates called upside down jellyfish. They are not really jellyfish. They are very squirty creatures.




There are tons of iguanas on Grand Cayman. They were everywhere! Look closely.



We went to Hell. It is a strange volcanic rock formation. I could have lived without seeing Hell.



We did not get nearly enough time at the beach. It was a really nice beach with a cool playground right on the beach. I honestly wish our tour would have skipped Hell and taken us straight to the beach. Oh well, we made up for it in Jamaica the next day.

Cozumel and Dolphin Encounter!

After a lazy day spent at sea on Monday, we arrived in Cozumel on Tuesday. We all hopped a van over to Dolphin Encounter. Analese and I were able to get in the water with the dolphins and do a lot of cool interactions. We got to pet, hug, kiss and feed the dolphin. The trainer also taught us some hand signals that they use and we were able to give the dolphins commands. It was a touch cool and breezy outside at about 72 degrees. The water was not warm by any stretch of the imagination. It was tolerable, but not exactly comfortable. The trainers had on wet suits, and I was wishing I had one on as well. Analese was cold, but she was distracted by the great experiences with the dolphins. Here are some of my favorite photos from the day.








Analese seemed to be having a great time despite the cold until the trainer gave the dolphin the signal to splash us. It was all in good fun. We were to splash the dolphin and the dolphin would splash us back. Analese had totally lost her sense of humor by this point, however. She took it as an assault and an insult that the dolphin splashed her. The real story is that she was too cold and simply ready to get out of the water. Luckily this meltdown happened in the last 5 minutes of our encounter. All in all it was a good time, and I LOVE this photo and memory:



After Analese dried off and warmed up, she had a fun time trying on the sombrero.



Mariele's favorite thing to do was to go back to the stateroom in the evenings and discover whatever towel animal that our stateroom attendant left for us.

Cruise!

I'm still here. The week after a vacation is always hectic, but it is exponentially more hectic when the week after post vacation week is Christmas week. We had a wonderful break from reality as we sailed about the Western Caribbean last week. I've had to kick things into panic mode now that we are home in order to get ready for Christmas. But I can't leave our cruise un-blogged, so here is the first of a series of blog posts. We sailed out of Galveston, Texas. On our previous cruises, we flew into Miami or Fort Lauderdale, so I thought it was quite a treat to be able to drive 100 miles and hop the cruise ship. The port at Galveston is not nearly as nice and well-run as the Florida ports, but once we made it onto the Voyager of the Seas, life was good. We were able to bring my mom along, which was absolutely wonderful since she is so good with the kids. Here we are getting ready to set sail out of Galveston.





The ship was absolutely beautiful. We had adjoining staterooms. Mom and Analese slept in one and the three of us slept in the other. It was nice at night after the kiddos went to sleep, because we could just open the door between the staterooms and Lee and I could go out onto the ship. We enjoyed hot chocolates while we sat in the solarium hot tub. We walked around and racked up some miles. We even did some jogging on the jogging track during the day. I really enjoyed those kidless evenings with Lee! Thanks again, mom!

Stay tuned for our adventures in Cozumel, Mexico!

The Big Dam Bridge and Garvin Gardens

On our trip to Arkansas we spent our Black Friday at The Big Dam Bridge, which is a heck of a sight more relaxing than what most people traditionally do on Black Friday. The Big Dam Bridge is an Arkansas tradition for me. I always want to rack up a few miles there when we go back to visit. We did not bring the double jogging stroller because we needed extra cargo space to bring home the awesome doll house that Lee's aunt and uncle have generously gifted the girls with. We did bring the compact single stroller. Analese insisted on pushing Mariele in the stroller. That lasted about halfway up the hill.




The next day we went to Hot Springs to visit Lee's old childhood buddy who was in our wedding. We had only briefly met his new wife a couple of years ago, so we got to spend time with both of them. It was nice getting to know Kevin's wife, Autumn. They took us to some recently developed botanical gardens called Garvin Gardens. It has only been developed in the last few years since we left Arkansas. This place is a true Arkansas gem, and Autumn's dad works there. They put up thousands of Christmas lights for the holidays. It was such a nice walk through a beautiful forest that was alive with lots of fall colors as well as gorgeous twinkling Christmas lights. The Japanese maples were absolutely beautiful, and the sun was setting and completely lighting them on fire. Times like that make me wish I could paint.



There were all of these beautiful bridges. I could not quite get the girls together on the bridge to take a picture from below. I always imagine these ideal shots in my mind. Oh well.






The Koi pond was beautiful. The koi were very slugish because it was cold. Autumn said that they let you feed the koi when it is warm.



Kevin took our pictures down by the waterfalls.




As it got darker, the photography became much more challenging. We did walk thorough the entire gardens and ended up at the miniature train sipping hot cocoa and eating popcorn and chatting it up with other folks that we knew (Arkansas is a small world). The girls just loved running ahead of us together. The stroller was just to push my mommy bag. So I got lots of these shots.