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Baseball coaches BBQ

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Our welcoming committee (Katie) was dressed and out waiting a good 15 minutes before guests were supposed to arrive!

I apparently don’t know how to make food for less than 30 people.

It was a BBQ so Tom did pulled pork (which requires cole slaw since we lived in North Carolina for eight years), baked beans, and cornbread. Then we added three flavors of smoked cream cheese with three types of crackers, pea and peanut salad, peanuts, cashews, fresh fruit and chips for the kiddos, and someone brought the veggie tray (and desserts which aren’t in the photo).

Another baseball championship!

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First games of the season were so hot you couldn’t stand it. Today? We’re in winter coats, gloves, and blankets!

They won 13-3 in six innings!

Owen getting his trophy!

We didn’t get any great team pics this season due to social distancing and temperature.

It was the last game together for these boys. Aden is transferring to a different city team and Jackson is moving to travel ball. Jackson’s dad is the head coach which means he’s moving to be with his son…so that means Tom has decided to be the head coach next season!!

Allure Day 7: No Cococay!

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We knew something was up when we weren’t pulling into the Cococay dock in the morning.

We knew there was a chance of rain but still held out hope. Then the captain came on and announced that the weather was too bad and we couldn’t dock the ship—the waves were crashing over the pier so they obviously couldn’t risk sending workers down to help dock. So we were heading a few miles out to sea to wait it out a bit…but in the meantime we went out on the decks and ran into a worker and she basically said in her experience it didn’t look good. We were bummed—we didn’t even ever get close enough for a picture (I think we were eating breakfast at the point we would have been closest to the island). So here we are with sad faces with Cococay waaay in the background.

And the smiling faces when we realized we’d get our $600 back for the Cabana. 😄

The cool art installation seen from the elevators:

It was gray and cool but the kids wanted to go to the pool so we sent them off. We figured it would be a great time to hit the adults only hot tub. Ha. Haha. It was packed. There was room in one of the bigger hot tubs… except it was more like a luke warm tub. I was actually COLD sitting in it!! It didn’t help that it was windy, but I was literally getting goosebumps under the water. SAD FACE.

We managed to stick it out for an hour or so (the waiter was pretty good) and then it was back to the room to take a hot shower and get ready for lunch—we were meeting our friends for lunch in the main dining room (where you get seated and waited on vs. the Windjammer buffet). That was good as well, except they missed my main entree…so Tom shared a few bites of his since it wasn’t liked I was going to go hungry.

Then Tom took Katie to get her face painted while I looked at the cruise photos and decided what to buy. I don’t remember what the drama was but she was Miss Pouty Face. Seriously?!

She went back to the pool while Owen and I hung out for a bit. One story of note. Owen had picked out his souvenir with Tom earlier—a watch. He had wanted a build-a-bear like Katie got but we talked him into something useful because he really doesn’t need a stuffed animal (she doesn’t either, but at least she still plays with them). So Tom had taken him too look at watches. When they came back, he warned me that the watch was a bit more expensive than he’d planned. Turns out, he picked out like six for Owen to choose from, and of course the one Owen picked was one that had been in the wrong basket so it was way more money. Tom didn’t have the heart to tell him no after he’d already agreed to get a watch and then spent time picking it out. So…we were walking around while Katie got her face painted and he was carrying his watch (he couldn’t wear it yet because it had to be set and it was not a normal type watch) and we stopped to go to the bathroom. Typically the mens and womens bathrooms are on the opposite side of the ship, but the ones we stopped at were down the same hallway. I headed into mine (carrying my drink) and told him to wait for me. So I get out and…SEE HIS WATCH BAG ON THE FLOOR. WHAT?! GRRRRRR. So I picked it up and waited. Needless to say when he came out I had something to say. I asked why he set it there and he said he didn’t want to take it in with him. OMGKIDS. I told him he ALWAYS needs to keep his stuff with him—even in the bathroom. That anyone could have waked by, seen the bag, and grabbed it…and then he’d be out a brand new watch and daddy would have been PISSED. I mean, it makes me think I’ve failed as a parent. WHY would he think that was what he should do? Ugh.

So then it was back to our room where we spent some time relaxing on our balcony before dinner…

Our nightly plates of French fries before dinner—they noticed we were all always stealing fries off the kids plates so they just automatically started bringing us two extra plates before we even ordered!

Saying goodbye to our awesome staff… Owen really wanted a picture!

Then it was one last ride on the carousel…

Then the kids wanted to go to the daycare one last time, so we let them go. We had wanted them to come with us to one last show but figured we’d let them do what they wanted. So we went to the show with Papa and Grannie. There were lots of employees there as guests, too, so we actually sat next to one of Owen’s Flow Rider instructors! After the show we took the grandparents to say goodbye to the kids since we wouldn’t be seeing them in the morning. Dad admitted that the cruise “wasn’t as bad as he thought it would be.” I guess that’s the best praise we could have gotten! Then we took the kids to bed because we had to be up really early to get off the ship.They had stayed by themselves just fine in the room before so we didn’t think anything about it. We told them they could watch TV and that was that.

This was waiting when we got back to the room. (Sidenote: we ended up getting ~$250 credit to use within the next year. I doubt it will get used.)

Our group kind of bar hopped for a bit. This was my last margarita at the martini bar…

And our group in the elevator as we were on our way to find karaoke for Greg. I snapped a pic because it was totally unusual that there was no one else in the elevator with us!

And then we found the bar! We had to wait for a few people (good and bad) and then it was Greg’s turn and of course he was awesome. So as we are all sitting there having a good time, guess who we see walking in, half crying? OWEN. WAIT, WHAT? With an employee behind him. It was like 11:30! And then Katie walked in behind them. WHAT THE—? Turns out they had both fallen alseep and then Owen woke up and got nervous that we weren’t there, so they went out looking for us! He said he went to a bunch of the bars and when he couldn’t find us, he went to Guest Services and they looked up where our charges were and saw we were next door at the bar so brought him over! GOOD GOD. And then they didn’t want to go back to the room and Katie wanted to stay with us at the bar. Um, no. So Tom took them back to the room and said we’d be home shortly. DAMN KIDS.

Allure Day 6: Sea Day

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So the kids found some ducks—I didn’t even know this was a thing! We put their names on some of them and then they hid them again.

The other thing they did was scour the ship for all the Small Wonders:

Owen had started finding them on his own (they are very obvious in some places) but then he discovered how many there were and he wanted to find them all. He thought he should ask a random employee where they all were and write them down. I suggested he go to Guest Services because they probably had a list—and they did! So then it was a dedicated scavenger hunt and he got all the other kids involved, too. They had the list with them and crossed them all off!

Then Aden, Owen, and Linda went ziplining! It was unbelievably scorching hot on the pool deck waiting for them. Like I thought my skin might burst into flames. Crazy.

So one very strange thing about the ship today was that it was VERY tilty. I think we had one instance on the Harmony last year where we could actually feel the ship moving and even then it was slight. This ship, which is barely a titch smaller, should have been the same. But today? Water was sloshing in the pool and a few times it felt like you were drunk and you could REALLY feel it moving. And the weather wasn’t bad at all…so no idea what was going on. Again, no pictures or videos. It was just a pain to have my phone out—I didn’t have pockets so I was carrying it in my purse (and if I was at the pool, it was generally in a bag). Oh well, I don’t need photos of everything, right?

Tom hadn’t been feeling well so was spending a bit of time in the room resting. He made it out of his cocoon this afternoon…just in time to go to Windjammer for chili cheese fries! They weren’t easily accessible on the pool deck like they were on the Harmony, but you could get the same thing at the buffet…so we only had them once. SAD FACE. But Owen had them with us! Katie didn’t want to leave the pool so we brought her some buttered noodles (which we had to force her to eat like four bites).

Our friend Greg was in the Belly Flop contest and actually won 2nd place. It was really fun—and kind of made me regret not attending ship events like this on other cruises. But then I realized that it was only that much fun because we knew people who were participating…and I would NOT have been sitting by the pool in the crazy hot sun if it was just us on the cruise.

Then it was off to napkin folding—everyone had fun except Katie who, because she couldn’t do it exactly like they demonstrated, was a hot pouty mess. A few of us even won small prizes in the folding competition (which almost made her more upset)! (Sidenote: by dinner I had forgotten everything I learned but Aden was rocking it!)

After napkin folding came the Katie drama…we were all talking about what we were doing next and the older boys wanted to go off on their own for a bit. Katie wanted to go with them but I wanted her to come back and shower and wash her hair (and Zander was going back to shower, too) but as I was talking to her, she just turned and ran off to catch up to the boys.

WAIT, WHAT?

Linda was standing there and looked at me and said “Did she just walk away from you while you were talking to her?” She sure did. I walked over to the elevator and saw all four of them heading up. I WAS PISSED. I also half wondered why Zander was on the elevator as he was supposed to have been heading to the bathroom…but Linda convinced me he wasn’t in the elevator so I forgot about it.

So we went up the next elevator and quick checked 9 (Aden’s floor), 12 (our floor), and then walked all around 15 (the pool deck) and no kids. I wasn’t worried for her safety or anything as they’d been off on their own lots…but she had blatantly ignored me and ran off so I thought I’d do a cursory look for her and drag her ass home if I found her. We didn’t find them, so it was back to the room where I not-so-elegantly told Tom that I WAS DONE and Katie was his the rest of the night. She came home with Owen about a half hour later—we sent Owen out on his own and she proceeded to get in BIG trouble. She had to stick to us like glue the rest of the night—we didn’t even let her go see a friend across the room at dinner. Damn kids. Making me be a parent and give consequences on my damn vacation.

At dinner two things happened. First, we discovered that our friends had some drama with Zander after we left them. They thought he was going to the bathroom but he wasn’t coming back so they went to check on him and he wasn’t there—he HAD been in the elevator with the other kids! So they didn’t know this (and the in-app texting was laughable so I didn’t get their messages) and I was lost in my own kid drama, so they had ended up starting to file a missing kid report…when (I think, again, it’s been too long now and my memory isn’t great) he walked behind them at Guest Services. KIDS!!!!

The second thing was Mark told us how during the day, one of the crew members had asked if he was crew or guest (I may be misremembering the exact details but that was the gist) so he joked that he should be a waiter. So he actually asked our waiter for his name tag so he could go to our friend’s table as a joke. So this happened:

He grabbed the bread basket off our table, grabbed a huge tray on the way to their table, and then actually STOPPED BY ANOTHER TABLE AND ASKED IF THEY WANTED BREAD and they didn’t even blink and said yes! Ha! Then he went to the friend’s table and got a double take from them. We got a good laugh out of that.

After dinner we let Owen go to Kid’s Adventure with Aden while the rest of us went back to the room (we were all tired, plus Katie was being punished). But then I checked the hours for build-a-bear (“pet at sea”) that Katie wanted for her memento and this was the last night we’d be able to get it (since we’d be at CocoCay the next day) so since I am not a total monster, we took her to do that, even though she was on lockdown.

This was actually something I complained about on the satisfaction survey as well—they were out of the “good” fluff in the machines so they had to stuff the bears with cheap crap (she won’t ever care but I know, plus they didn’t get to fill it from the machine) plus they were out of the birth certificates. Really? You are out of a basic printed product? So you’re telling me your on-board print center that prints THOUSANDS of multi-color and multi-page documents a day can’t make a copy of a single page birth certificate for a $40 bear? REALLY?

I took Tylenol PM to make sure I slept well…but that meant I was falling asleep when Owen still wasn’t home. He had to leave the adventure club by 10 and wasn’t home by 10:15 and Tom wanted to go to bed so he had to go out and find him. Three last thing I remember is them walking in the door but I don’t remember Tom getting into bed!

Allure Day 5: San Juan

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We decided to eat breakfast at Johnny Rockets again before heading out into San Juan. The breakfast sandwich with extra bacon was really yummy. While we were sitting there waiting to be seated and then waiting for food, I think we made at least seven trips back to the room—I sent Katie for my hair clip, then I wanted the Aleve, Tom went up for his hat, I went up for a battery backup (it was our first day with internet and I knew we’d run our phones down)…it got to be quite comical.

Owen loved having his own camera.

Papa stayed behind today as he didn’t want to walk through the city. As it turned out that was a good call as it’s really hilly and it was really hot. Our first planned destination was the Chocobar. We’d been there on our last cruise and knew we wanted to go back.

Unfortunately I had forgotten that we wanted to eat there…so we only had drinks and churros again. That’s a Chocolate Bloody Mary (I wouldn’t get it again).

Then it was off to the fort. I could have cared less about visiting there again—I had more than enough the last time. But we were with our friends and I didn’t want to miss out, so there I was. We stopped to let the kids cool off before heading over…

And then it was back into town to hit the street of umbrellas (which were army themed this time)…

And a recommended restaurant, Raices. With a margarita, of course. 🙂

The remnants of their shaved ice.

The kids didn’t want a single thing on the menu so they just sat and played while we ate. We really wanted to try mofongo since we didn’t the last time.

Mofongo is a Puerto Rican dish with fried plantains as its main ingredient. Plantains are picked green and fried, then mashed with salt, garlic, broth, and olive oil in a wooden pilón. -Wikipedia

Tom ordered butter garlic octopus mofongo and I got fish tacos. The mofongo was good but my fish tacos were outstanding. Not much to look at in this picture but super delicious. The only bad thing was that it took so long to get our food that we were starting to worry about getting back to the ship on time—we were only a few blocks away but you do not want to miss the ship—so we all had to eat fairly fast. I really wish we could have eaten slower and enjoyed it longer.

Heading back to the ship! With time to spare!

Half an hour later? This.

The kids were down at the pool with the other families.

I was back in the room working feverishly while we still had internet as we were leaving the port—a new product had dropped so I was busy posting on my group and trying to post a few vacation pics!!

It was hot by the pool…and hard to see to take a good selfie.

Soon it was time to get ready for our second formal night. And joy of joys we had drama with Katie and her hair. JUST LIKE AT HOME. YIPPEE.

She had been in the pool so much and hadn’t really shampooed it well (since I wasn’t doing it daily like at home) so it was a total rats nest. But she wouldn’t let me wash it and complained and whined when I couldn’t do her hair like she wanted. I was still able to do something cute but she was very unhappy and that pretty much solidified that I don’t want to vacation with the kids again (I mean, who wants to parent on vacation?!). So we left the room and she had a total grouch face… Which is why I’m surprised I got these super cute pics.

We were walking through the Promenade since we had a few extra minutes to take photos…

And a bunch of the ship photos we took but didn’t buy. 🙂

The second formal night means lobster tails!!! I thought I’d get two, but Owen didn’t eat all of his (but he ordered it!) so I finished his. Our awesome server made this and we had to take a picture for Gramma Jean.

Afterwards we changed clothes, saw our daily towel animal…

…then went to an acapella show. It was decent, but Katie wasn’t terribly interested and…

Allure Day 3: Sea Day

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While we were hanging out in the room at one point yesterday afternoon and I was looking through the app to see what was going on the next day, I saw that there was an opening for a private Flow Rider lesson at 8am. We thought that would be a special cruise treat for Owen (Katie had a cupcake decorating class with Tom scheduled for the day) so we were up early to be on the pool deck early! Papa and Grannie made it there, too! It was really nice and peaceful and quiet that early!!

Owen had fun, but unfortunately, I think the lessons need to be revamped. I know that everything on a cruise is a money grab…and this was no different. I knew my $69 wasn’t going to get an hour of personal time, but it was ridiculous to have to sit through SIX OTHER PEOPLE—especially because your own time relied totally on the whims of the instructors and how well you were doing. If you fell a lot, you got about three tries in three minutes. If you managed to stay up, they let you stay up until you fell—and then maybe let you go again. So Owen maybe got seven minutes total and another woman probably got 12 because she was better and didn’t fall as fast. It would be somewhat better if your lesson was a dedicated 10 minutes (and I said as much on my survey).

The kids played mini golf.

We played our elevator game—we’d all predict which elevator would arrive first!

I enjoyed my first quiet time on our balcony…

Then it was cupcake time! Owen and I were off shopping for lanyards and then came to check them out at the end of their class. They invited us in and we ended up taking home the instuctor’s cupcake plus she gave us EACH free Ben & Jerry’s ice cream (it was for class participants only). We bought Katie an apron and a pink bag.

Katie did really well!! The cupcakes weighed about 2# each with the amount of frosting on them!! And we had THREE to carry back to the room! But Katie had decided that she was giving hers to Mark, and he was actually next door at Sabor, so we went and delivered it! Then it was back to the room where we ran into Papa and brought him back to the room. He enjoyed eating the remains of one of the cupcakes.

The kids then headed off to the pool and I went for some margaritas. 🙂 The avocado one was strangely good—every sip was like THIS IS WEIRD but then ended with BUT GOOD. Then we sat by the pool with our friends and drank while the kids played in the pool.

Some artwork in the vestibule on my way to the bathrooms.

On our way to dinner and playing the elevator game!

At one point they had a conga line with the staff and all the kids went off and had a blast!

And Hai was doing toothpick games for us.

Zoltar worked this time! But we didn’t get a card or anything. It was a little disappointing.

I can’t remember where we were but apparently the kids were at another bar with our friends and their kids…

Our towel animal!

We let the kids run around while we went out and about, and apparently they ended up with friends on the Rising Tide bar!

We called it a night pretty early since we would be in St. Thomas first thing in the morning and our excursion started at 8:30!

Allure Day 2: Sea Day!

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We didn’t get great sleep because Katie was coughing all night (even with NyQuil). The kids got up about 6:30 and I was able to ignore them until about 7—they wanted to go out and run around so I sent them out with instructions to be back by 8 for breakfast (Tom was working out and that gave me time to shower). It’s really great to be able to send them out on their own.

Tom and I had to stop to get our usual breakfast Bloody Marys (though the bar here is called Bow & Stern instead of Boot & Bonnet) and Linda joined us. We also enjoyed the people watching.

Then we introduced the kids and grandparents to the huge Windjammer buffet for breakfast.

Owen really wanted to to the flow rider so that was next. The little kids were bummed they were too small to do it but they had fun hanging out together.

He practiced twice on the boogie boards (stomach and knees) which then allowed him to upgrade to surfing at the more advanced station.

Now, just because he passed didn’t mean he was that good, LOL. It just meant that he had passed the bare minimum. Unfortunately he got super bummed on the next level because he kept falling—and they told him he was done. He misunderstood, though, and thought they meant he was DONE with the flow rider… but they just meant his turn was over. But he was also bummed because he didn’t stand up by himself and thought he was a failure. So we had to talk him down from that.

And we might have had a drink or two.

The rest of the afternoon included lunch, a veterans service (we all got medals and cake!), just hanging out around the ship, eating lunch, and watching the ice show.

Interestingly, I noticed this piece of art. Notice where it’s from?!

Tonight was also the first formal night. We were coming from the ice show so were already running behind, and then Tom realized he had forgotten his cuff links…so he ran down quick to the gift shops to buy some…and no one had any!! What?! So we were trying to figure out what he could use…and we ended up using a pair of Katie’s earrings (far from perfect but they worked for a bit). We also took formal family photos on the way into dinner…and one was good enough that I bought it!

The menu is good every night but some nights you just need to order four starters (they typically have four selections that change nightly and four “classics” that stay the same). I definitely took advantage of the Escargot many nights and Tom (and Owen) got the French Onion soup many nights.

Our server Hai was really great with the kids and was already making them balloon and napkin animals on the second night! We wondered what the rest of the week would have in store!

Owen was in the bathroom while this was happening and Aden was super sweet and made sure that she made a sword for him as well.

We took the kids to the Adventure Camp daycare after dinner with our friends’ kids and then went and hung out in our old favorite bar, Schooners. I tried to order my drink that I basically lived on last year, joking with the bartender that he had a lot to live up to…and surprisingly he was less than inviting. And I’d even go so far as to say he was a bit short with me. It was very odd, because normally all staff are very considerate and jovial and he…was not. Needless to say we didn’t go back there after that night.

But! We did have fun, as we ended up meeting our friends’ friends and their friends’ friends that night! So the eight of us just hung out talking and half singing along with the piano guy and having fun for a few hours.

The big joke was that Greg looked like Blake Shelton so I was taking “sneak shots” pointing at him behind me, saying I was going to post them on Facebook saying LOOK WHO I SAW ON MY CRUISE! (If you look closely you can see his wife laughing behind me because we set this up and he was posing.) And then he kept making fun saying JENNIFER HUDSON IS IN THE HOUSE!

Well, come to find out, he is an actual country singer! He joked that he’s famous within a 5-mile radius and I told his wife Anne that it was killing me not to be able to Google him which she found hilarious. So we just called him Blake and it was most of the night before I learned his real name was Greg. The other couple were were with—Mike and Melanie—were great, too.

Then we took a break for everyone to go get the kids from daycare. (Sidenote? They all said they hated it! Apparently all the other kids were rude and mean! No one wants to go back again!!)

And then this happened. I opted not to buy that photo.

Then we sent the kids to bed…and I made this happen because why not?!

From previous conversation, apparently Blake/Greg has a real knack for winning stuffed animals so we ended up going to the casino so the boys could try their hand at the Cash Claw game where a few of them tried unsuccessfully, of course, to win wrapped $100 stacks. It did provide us quite a bit of entertainment, though.

After we left the casino, the professional photographers were still out so we made the boys do this:

Later we determined they were the Bad Back Boys (a la Backstreet Boys grown up).

Shortly thereafter we called it a night and this is what we found when we got back to the room.

Allure Day 1: Embarkation!

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Sunday—Fort Lauderdale, FL

We had a quick hotel breakfast and then it was time to board the shuttle at 9:30. Embarkation went really super easy and fast—our shuttle left the hotel about 9:40 and we were getting on the ship about 10:50! After we got through check-in, we were just finishing getting our group picture taken when our friends came around at the corner…so we were able to get a group photo together! It turned out really good so that was one of the six that I bought!

Some quick snaps while the professional was taking her photos.

Then a little bit of check-in (the kids had to get security bands that they would need to wear the entire cruise) and playtime (there was a playset in the waiting area).

And before we knew it we were headed up the gangway!

The first thing we weren’t expecting was NOT walking right onto the hustle and bustle of the ship’s Promenade. We actually had to walk down about 30 yards. But we headed straight to Boleros, the bar where we got our first drink on the Harmony—and the place we got our beloved wrist bands. AND LEARNED THERE WERE NO WRIST BANDS ON THIS SHIP!! WHAT?!?!?! Yeah, they don’t have the technology for it on this ship—they will (hopefully) after the upcoming spring 2020 renovation but for now it’s old school.

Well, it’s certainly first world problems but that was really disappointing because we’d talked them up so much to the kids and were excited that we’d actually managed to save our bands from the last cruise. But we didn’t plan ahead with lanyards because we thought we’d all have wristbands!! (Note: I did happen to throw in two lanyards so Owen and Katie were able to use those but Tom and I just used pockets or my purse.)

Since we were at a bar…we got our first drinks—of course a margarita and a mojito.

We sat down to gather our thoughts a bit since Dad needed to sit and rest. The kids went to check out the pizza place and our friends wandered in the bar. We then explored the ship a little and the kids and Grannie rode the carousel.

And I got a margarita from the Mexican restaurant…I started with the Sweet and Spice and it was yummy.

Then we all met at Chops for lunch. I had to sit in the big fancy chair in the lobby.

We really enjoyed it, but BIG SURPRISE Katie didn’t like anything. She did start with the jumbo shrimp cocktail but didn’t like it and it was downhill from there (she didn’t even like the mac and cheese).

You can see all our shirts!! Kind of.

When it was time for dessert Tom said he wanted nothing. He got it.

Then he and Mark were joking about it being the Marine corps birthday so Mark told the waitress that it was Tom’s birthday…

It was really fun, the food was excellent, and we all had a good time.

After Chops, the kids explored more with Papa and Grannie and went to the pool while Tom and I decorated the room door as a suprise.

And Papa and Grannie’s door:

We were also finally able to get in our room (though we had no luggage yet)…and we were really surprised by the differences between the Harmony and the Allure. We had thought it would be pretty much the exact same…ha.

The room was definitely a little smaller and not laid out as nicely (the bathroom and balcony were smaller, the closet was in an awkward spot, and the couch/kids’ bed was closest to the window), we didn’t have nice big desk drawers for clothes, and there were only two outlets in the entire room! (And you can’t bring extension cords so you’re stuck.)

There were other little differences that jumped out, too. For example:

  • The bar where we get our Bloody Marys doesn’t have the nice high back leather chairs we used for people watching (and drinking our bloody Marys) in the morning. And the Bloody Mary bar (shrimp, bacon, etc., is apparently somewhere else).
  • We can’t text. You have to use their app and it’s constantly logging you out and dropping the wifi signal.
  • They didn’t have the chili cheese fries at the pool Cafe!!!

Tom stayed in the room to rest and I went up to find everyone at the pool and sat on the lounge chairs for a bit. Katie had her first of many ice creams…

Ignore my lips. I put it on waaay too thick so it came off.

Then it was time to leave!!! Tom did make it up to join us.

We showed the kids the room and got changed for dinner. Soon it was time for dinner and it was great. Owen ordered from the adult menu and had steak and Katie got pizza from the kids menu. They had fun with their friends. We enjoyed French onion soup (Tom) and crab cakes and oysters (Jen), prime rib (Tom) and a seafood mash (Jen), and pear blueberry crumble (Jen) and molten lava cake (Tom). It was all good except the crumble was pretty plain (it was sugar free). At the time I thought I didn’t really need to take pics of the menus because I didn’t need to record everything we ate… But now, after the fact, I wish I had.

I do know we had dessert shots every night—our friend Mark had heard about them on his previous cruise (they aren’t on any menu). They were always very good and were always something mixed with Bailey’s!!

After dinner we went back to the room and the kids were excited for their first towel animal!

(They had been bummed there was no towel animal so we asked our steward about it. So we were nicely surprised after dinner!)

Then it was off for the big water show Ocean Aria. They did a little crowd warm up and this happened:

The show really was something to see—divers and acrobatics using a tiny little pool. The kids loved it, though, and eventually went and sat right up front and got splashed! After they went down, a huge group of kids joined them!

Afterward we let the kids roam the ship on their own (we wandered as well) and gave them instructions to be back to the room by 9:30 and they were! So then they were allowed to go out again on their own until 10:30. They were out playing ping-pong and who knows what else. We did sign them up for the kids adventure camp thing so they’ll do that later this week.

It’s time, y’all! We’re Florida and Royal Caribbean bound!!

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Look who we ran into at the airport?! (We actually knew they’d be there as their flight got changed recently.)

As luck would have it, we were in rows 25 and 27…and they were in row 26…so we rearranged to all sit with our friends!

Zander is always twirling Katie’s hair. They both like it.

The kids were all amazing on the flight…

Red Hots win! Congrats to the GYB fall champs!

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Owen’s team won the fall championship in a 19-17 nail biter today! They were up a few and then down by 10 (and we thought the game might get called by the slaughter rule), then we caught up, then they caught up, and then we were ahead by two and held them off!! Owen did his thing on 1st and caught the ball for the final out of the game! We are so proud of all the boys!!

Here’s a few pics from the game. Owen on second.

A typical sight: tying shoelaces.

Attempting to steal home. I can’t remember if he did or not.

Katie was being punished for earlier transgressions at home and had to sit by me the entire game, so I got these.

The game was stressful to watch because the score was so back-and-forth. But once we came back from being 10 runs down, the entire mood changed and it was a real game!! We were ahead by two going into the top of the seventh inning so we expected they’d score and we’d have to rally in the bottom of the seventh (and last) inning but the boys held them off!

I was taking pics of the last plays and got these. They aren’t great because the fence was in the way, but I love the progression of the excitement, then the boys coming in from the field, then throwing hats in the air! I wished I had gotten a shot of Owen actually catching the ball but it is what it is.

Award ceremony!

TEAM PHOTO!

Funny team photo!

Running the bases (Owen led the way)!

Friends. 💕

Coaches Tom, Ken, Jamie (Head Coach), Mark

Happy boy!

Happy daddy!

Fun with Coach Jamie!

And then it was off to Culver’s to celebrate!

Scout camping weekend

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So long story short… Owen has kind of joined scouts. A few of his baseball friends (and dads) are involved and of course they talk about how fun it is and of course Owen wants to do fun things with them…so Tom and I talked and I basically told him I don’t want to be involved so if HE wants to do it with Owen, be my guest. 😄 So they went to a few meetings and then it was time for the big weekend camping trip to Starved Rock, a local State Park campground. The whole family was invited but I opted to stay home for some alone time and Tom was looking forward to taking both kids.

DAY 1

So come Friday afternoon they were all packed and ready to go! I even got Owen out of school a bit early since they had a 2.5-hour drive to get there.

I’m not sure they have enough stuff for 1.5 days (Friday night, Saturday, leaving really early Sunday). We borrowed a tent and then had to take sleeping bags, air mattresses (because how can they sleep on the ground like animals), pillows, backpacks, rain gear, etc.

Fast forward to later that evening when I asked for proof of life and got a text that they (and some friends) were at a local bar because by the time they got there and got set up the camp kitchen was closed. But as it would happen, a marine was having his retirement party so they all got invited to a free buffet!

And then later they did actually sit around a fire for a bit.

DAY 2

Tom taught the boys how to fold flags.

Getting ready to go on a hike by themselves! (The parents followed behind enough to be unseen but still keep an eye on them.) They also took pack lunches.

And then I got this from Tom about noon…and he said he was contemplating packing up and coming home.

I told him to suck it up—he wanted to go camping. 😜

So this is what things looked like later when everyone was gathered under our awning while it rained cats and dogs.

And everyone ended up back at the bar again for dinner—and to get out of the storm. I may have gotten a few THIS REALLY SUCKS texts.

DAY 3

They were up and on the road by 7 Sunday morning so they could get home in time for the last baseball playoffs game. (Our team was so awesome that they won the first game of the playoffs without the coach, two assistant coaches, and three players who were all camping!!) They pulled in shortly before 9:30 and I immediately proceeded to do laundry because everything was wet and muddy.

Tom’s overall feeling on the weekend was it totally sucked because of the bad weather but the kids had fun and he wants to do it again…though maybe in a pop-up or something bigger. The kids did have a blast and can’t wait to go again.

Before & After: Garden Veg

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I’m not sure exactly what this is going to turn into, but I know it’s going to be delicious. How can you go wrong roasting red onions, garlic, and garden fresh tomatoes, banana peppers, and serrano peppers? (The serrano peppers were from our friend’s garden.)

After roasting I decided to just grind it all up into a paste. I think maybe bruschetta or on pizza? It has a little kick to it!

And then I just sliced and froze some jalapenos because we can’t use all these before they go bad!

2nd Annual Back-to-school BBQ waterslide party!

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We had so much fun last year we decided to do it again!!

The kids were very intrigued when Tom started using the blow torch on the ribs.

It took awhile but by the end of the night, some dads (and one mom—not me!) went down the slide. Which led us to wonder how on Earth these kids could do this non-stop… The adults got tired after just a few times. 😄

And then it was over…the cleanup aftermath. And we can’t wait until next year!!

Cardinals got second place!

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Congrats, Cardinals! Nothing wrong with second place after your amazing season!


BACK: Assistant Coaches Mark, Eric, Adam, Tom, and Head Coach Jamie
FRONT: Mason, Eli, Owen, John, Aden (Old Man), Jackson, Reuben, Jaiden, John, and Wyatt

I could not be more proud of this team of boys. To be perfectly honest, they started out on shaky ground and we didn’t have much hope for the season. But then a miraculous thing happened…they practiced, they learned how to work together, and they exceeded all our expectations and ended up in second place in their division!!

Watching them play was a joy (and also completely nerve-wracking as the mom of a pitcher)!! And it warms my heart to see my boy with 10 new best friends, my girl with almost as many player sibling friends, and my husband and I with a handful of new friends as well.

Of course they were disappointed that they didn’t win (especially since they’d won the last few games by a wide margin) but they took it in stride and were great sports.

And then it was off to Culver’s to celebrate!! Yes, Katie loves being right in there with all the boys!! But she moved to the girls table one everyone arrived!!

And a friend sent me this… love these kids.