Easter 2022

 It came.. We celebrated. We had way too much candy. Happy Easer!

Spring Break 2022

 We were finally able to go our the cruise we had planned to go on in 2020... then again in 2021....Finally!

So glad we were able to go. 

We flew into Houston and boarded the ship in Galveston. Everything pre-boarding was stressful. We all had to have a negative covid test (we did), the flight had to be on time (it wasn't) and not cancelled (it wasn't). We made it despite the late flight and once on the ship, all (most) our cares melted away. 

This was one of the largest ships we've ever been on. I think I might be a bigger fan of the midsized ships it seemed like there was just a lot of people with the same amount of public space. 

We still had a great time. We hit up the Skytrack and the ropes course first thing and explored the ship. 

The kids had fun on the water slides. Roman found his crowd pretty quickly and was done with us. Marisa and Ezra visited the kids club a little but mostly just wanted to hang out together.

We always had dinner together. Ezra liked to order the "exotic flavors" which included alligator, escargot, frog legs and calamari and wild boar.

We had to document Shane eating green beans.

I liked to spend my time out in the sun.  This is a picture (just a splash really) of a dolphin I saw while out on the deck, It was literally a few minutes after I had told Marisa that we wouldn't see any dolphin or whale. She left and then while I was looking out at sea I saw a bunch of birds. When I looked closer it was a pod of dolphin having lunch. I even saw a dolphin jump completely out of the water. It was crazy. By the time Marisa made it back to me, they were gone. :(

Marisa and I went to a few shows and we watched a few movies out on the deck.

Our first port was Jamaica. There wasn't really much we wanted to do there so we just hopped off the boat and looked for souvenirs. Marisa had her hair braided and we went for a little walk around the town. 

It was really hot.

It was admittedly a little scary and you could tell that beyond the port was not really meant for tourists.  But we found a little side road and hopped a fence that took us to a place to take a nice picture. 

I guess some things DO need to be said. 

This happened to be my birthday. We played on the ship, ordered steak at dinner and went to a comedy show that night. 

Our next stop was Grand Cayman.  This was a stop I have been looking forward to and they shortened our port time by 5 hours!  

We did get to go to Sting Ray City. Which is a sand bar a miles off the island where all these sting ray converge, the water is crystal clear and the guides know how to catch the rays so you can play with them.

It was amazing. The water so clear and the sting ray are so friendly. 

We really wanted to go to the beach after that but we just didn't have the time. I was so bummed! I blame covid. Can't we blame it for everything these days?

Our last stop was Cozumel. This one was just ok. We wanted to go to the beach but all the beaches were resort owned so it was expensive and the weather created water that was full of seaweed and mud so it wasn't the crystal clear water that is so nice. 

We paid the fee and made the most of it though.  If I go back.... I'd pay for a snorkeling excursion that takes you somewhere nicer though. The kids got to say they've been to Mexico so there's that. 

A few more days at sea and 7 days was gone in a flash! It was a nice vacation and I'm so glad that we were able to go. 

With Shane's magic and a lot of time on the phone, we got a fantastic deal and we really were so lucky that it all came together. I don't know what we would have done if it had been canceled again. We've got kids growing up (heaven help me)