Eleven

 Trenton had a birthday recently.  A while back I asked him what he wanted for his birthday this year.  He gave me three choices, and said to surprise him.  He either wanted a chess set, some new Legos, or a lizard.  As his birthday got closer, he came to me and said, "Mom, I know I gave you three different gift ideas, but just so you know, I really, really, REALLY want a lizard."  As you can see, he got the lizard.  And, I have to tell you, Trenton loves and takes very good care of his new pet.

Birthday celebrations this year included:

 Sunday dinner with the whole family.  (Trenton shares a birthday with his uncle Sean.)

Even Ziggy came to the party.

Going to have lunch with this AWESOME kiddo at school.  He got to come home after recess and take the rest of the day off.  He chose homemade waffles, homemade whipped cream, cheesy eggs, and sausage for his birthday dinner.  (He's my kind of kid!)  And we had chocolate cake with chocolate frosting, and ice cream for dessert.

It has been another wonderful year of watching Trenton grow and mature in so many ways.  We love you kiddo!  Happy birthday!

Tomorrow Never Comes

My little Viv... She is a planner.  She always wants to know what the plan for the day is, down to the minutest detail.  Our day usually consists of questions like:

 "Mom, what are we going to do today?"

"I know we're going to the store, but what are we doing after we go to the store?"

"Are we going anywhere after I get home from school today?"

"If we have time in between ________ and _________, can we do _________?"

Just to name a few.

After we have followed this line of questioning for 20-30 minutes, and she has asked every last question she can think to ask about the current day's plan, she starts to go into, "Well, what are we doing tomorrow?"

By this point I just don't even want to think about the things we need to get done today any longer, let alone tomorrow.  Because, you see, I am not a planner.  I have to be somewhat of a planner with all of our different schedules, but for the most part, I kind of like to the fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants, so to speak.  You know, just take it as it comes.  Anyway, I digress... So, lately, Vivi has started throwing in another question every day.  She has been asking me, "Mom, is it tomorrow now?"  And of course I answer, "Nope!  It's today!"  

"No mom.  I mean, is it tomorrow?"

"No Vivi.  It is today."

To which she starts to get a little huffy and puffy.  "Mom!  When is it going to be TOMORROW?!"

"Never Viv, because it is always today.  Tomorrow never comes."

To which she gets so flustered that she usually forgets to ask me her usual assortment of questions.  I don't know what it is, but I just love messing with my kid's heads sometimes.  ;)

Another Year, Come and Gone

 Oh, this boy... How I love him.  He turned 9 on me a few weeks ago.  NINE!!!  When did this happen?!  I feel like he should still be two!  I am so grateful for the day that Colson came to join our family.  He has brought so much joy, laughter, and happiness into our home.

We had a fun time celebrating his birthday with him.  As per our tradition, we took lunch to him at school on his birthday.

  We took him out of school early and ended up going through the car wash before we went home.  While waiting in line for the car wash, we had all the windows rolled down.  (It was a beautiful day that day!)  Before going in the car wash, Colson said, "Mom, you better roll up the windows.  Otherwise there will be a lot of squirting and splashing in the car.  It would be mayhem!"  He is always saying funny, zany things.  I remember just shortly after he had turned 2, I had done something to make him laugh one day, and he looked at me and said, "Mom... You're a hoot-and-a-half!"  Love this kid.

 The grandmas came over that night for dinner, cake, and ice cream.  As always, Colson asked for chocolate cake with chocolate frosting.

And of course, it wouldn't be a birthday at our house without the balloon launch.

Happy birthday Colson!  We love you buddy! 

Caribbean Cruise, Cont.

St. Lucia

   The next stop on our trip was the beautiful Island of St. Lucia.  It was on this day that as we talked to the kids, Trenton said to me, "Mom, I can handle you being gone for three days, and now you've been gone for six!  When are you coming home?!"  He's used to dad traveling for days at a time, but I guess having mom gone for that long too was a little too much for him.  ;) 

We had a tour guide in St. Lucia, so we saw quite a bit of the island.  Apparently, St. Lucia is where the show "The Bachelor" was filmed this last season.  It was a beautiful place!  Very lush and tropical.  I think everything grew there!  Almost every tree we saw had some type of fruit or nut growing on it.  Tons of mango and banana trees. 

Had to get a picture of Trent with the perky peaks in the background. ;)

Lots of beautiful sights to see.

 Leaving St. Lucia.

Antigua

The next day, we stopped at Antigua.  The beaches there were AMAZING!  Look at that water!

We spent the day in Antigua just hanging on the beach and at the Lobster Shack that was about 30 feet from the beach.  Looking at that water makes me wanna go back!

St. Martin

Day 4 was in Saint Martin/Sint Maarten, depending on if you were on the French side or the Dutch side.  We spent the morning shopping around on the French side of the island, then headed back to the Dutch side in the afternoon for some more shopping.  (We hadn't done any souvenir shopping on the trip yet.)

With some of the group.  Trent, me, Lisa and Bob in back, Claire and Steve up front.  We bought some amazingly yummy Gouda cheese at this place.

Leaving St. Martin.

St. Croix

  We went on a Jeep island excursion in St. Croix.  I've never been so scared for my life!

We were packed into these Jeeps, and the drivers cruised through the jungles at top speed, nearly missing other cars around several blind turns.

This place was the home of the "Beer Drinking Pig".  This is one of the tourist attractions on the island of St. Croix.  People will pay to feed this pig beer, but it only drinks a special kind of beer.  To bad for us, there was no beer that day. ;)

This was a Rastafarian's house.  It was made out of scraps of metal, garbage, and various other things.

Beautiful, beautiful views in St. Croix!

This is what was left of one of the old sugarcane mills.

As part of the Jeep excursion, they took us off road on some serious 4 wheel drive trails, into this cove.

We spent an hour or so swimming around in the cove.

Love this man!

On our way back to Puerto Rico.

We had such a wonderful time on our trip!  Thanks Trent for working so hard so that we could go on this amazing vacation together!  You're the best!

A Little Catching Up to Do

I am WAY behind on my blogging.  Way.  We'll see if I can get caught up over the next week.

Trent and I got back from our trip to the Caribbean on May 2.  We had such a wonderful time!  We were supposed to get in to Puerto Rico a couple of days before leaving port, but due to some yucky weather we were having here in CO, we missed our connecting flight and ended up in Philly for a night.  But, no complaints, there was a hotel right next to the airport with room service, no children, and a bed I didn't have to make the next morning. ;)

We made it to Puerto Rico the next day.  We got to the hotel, checked in to our room, got our exercise clothes on (we were still motivated to exercise at that point), and went for a run along the ocean.  Beautiful I tell you!

The next day we hopped on the boat and set sail for Barbados.

We had two full days on the boat before we got to Barbados, so we mostly just lazed around by the pool, drank lots of Pina Coladas (virgin of course ;) and did a whole lot of nothing.  Pure bliss I tell you!  I read two books while we were gone.

In Barbados, we went on a catamaran excursion with the group we were on the cruise with.

I love this one of Trent in his snorkel gear.  We saw lots of sea turtles, a sting ray or two, and tons of fish.

I think the highlight for Trent was doing crazy dives, belly flops, and cannon balls of the side of the boat, and just showing off in general.  ;)

 

Here are some of the wonderful people from our group... (left to right) Trent, Chris, Jill, and Chelsea.

Brian (starting on the right), Jonelle, Amy, Claire, and Steve.

Dale, Renee, Chris, deckhand (can't remember his name), Steve and Claire.

Sharon (the amazing lady who planned and put together the whole trip), Jill, and Chelsea.

Lundy and Kit.

Apparently, this hotel here costs a mere 25,000 - 30,000 dollars a night to stay at .  HOLY MOLY!  I couldn't believe it when the crew told us that.  We had a nice little swim in the ocean just down the way a little.  I forgot how much sea water stings the eyes.

Heading back to the boat after a day of fun.  More of the rest of the trip to come later.