Cruising the Dream for Christmas!

Our new Christmas picture was taken in the atrium of Carnival's new boat, the Dream.  For 5 years now, we have been asking my parents for a cruise for our christmas present...well, this summer I came up with the idea of going on a cruise instead of having Christmas (in other words we put our money towards the cruise instead of buying presents).  It was like a light bulb went off in my mom's head and she was game!  We did lots of research and found out that Carnival was coming out with a new boat that was 130,000 gross tons.  It all sounded very appealing...once we were on the boat, we came to realize that the bigger the boat, the more people there were, and the longer the lines were to get food...good thing it's available 24 hours a day :)

The other issue I had was the lack of 'Christmas' on the boat.  I expected Santa to be there posing with the families and letting kids sit on his lap all week long.  To our disappointment, Santa only showed up Christmas afternoon.  How do they expect the kids to tell Santa what they want after Christmas eve.

We did have an amazing time, though!!  After all the stress of packing and getting ready for Christmas & Haley's birthday, what could be better than taking a week long break where all you have to do as a mom is worry about what time to have the family ready to be served dinner!  I didn't have to think about schedules, laundry, running errands, what we were going to eat for our meals, or fighting with the kids to go down for a nap.  They were so worn out by nap time, that they almost asked to go to sleep...or at least I did ;) And our naps were so good in our pitch-black room!!!  It was a great experience, but we definitely missed being gathered around the fireplace opening stockings on Christmas morning.  In my opinion, I think the week after Christmas would be the perfect week to cruise.

bikinis

Last night, I'm fixing the kids' plates for dinner and Connor asks "Mommy, what's that green thing." "It's zucchini", I replied. After taking a bite of the zucchini I hear..."mmmm, mommy i love bikinis. Haley do you like bikinis? They are my favorite."

I couldn't help but laugh and wished I had another adult there to share in my laughter (unfortunately Van was still at practice).

joining the blog world...

Well, we've finally started a blog. I hope to be adding to this frequently, but we'll see how that goes. As for now, I will update everyone with what is going on in our world... We just finished moving into our 7th house as a married couple!!! (although I'm not sure I can say that if we still have boxes in our living room)...its only like 2 miles from where we did live. Van's basketball season is well under way and he is staying very busy. The team is doing great for their first year, in my opinion, with a 6-4 record (they had a tough week last week with 2 losses). If you ask Van, you might get a different opinion. Coaches always perceive things differently than the fans. All of their losses have been close games and they definitely could have won them.

I am busy with the little ones and doing some part time work for my dad. Connor is in preschool this year and loves it. The other day, out of no where, he counts to six in Spanish...i had no idea he knew how :) It's hard to believe Haley will be 2 on Christmas. She's growing and learning so much...can't believe my baby is a toddler.

Our boxes may not be unpacked...but we have our christmas tree up!!!