Time with Aunt Becca

While Mom and Dad played in Cancun, we got to hang out with Aunt Becca all week. She stayed with us and got help from Grandma and Aunt Angie. She would send Mom pictures every now and then or post funny things to social media.

Like this post...on day 6 of taking care of Iva, clearly there was a meltdown involving crooked trains.

But Iva loved being silly with Aunt Becca...

Thursday was a big day! We played hooky from school and got to swim at SHAC...we were the only ones there because everyone else was in school!

Then that night, we went to the rodeo! We got all dressed up! We even made Aunt Becca where a bandana. If you can believe it, all of us stayed awake for the Nitro Circus demonstration at the end.

And then there were these silly pictures that kept Mom and Dad smiling.

OH and how could we forget?! Aunt Becca even helped us run a lemonade stand! Our greatest dream come true. Mom never does it! We made $10 and sold all the lemonade. It was awesome.

Siena the Great turns EIGHT!

Guest post by Mom:

This lovable goofball is eight today.

Every year I feel like I want to say the same thing. She's amazing. She's helpful. She's kind. She's funny. She's bright. She's happy. I have been truly grateful to be her Mom. Parenting is not easy, but I am acutely aware that this happy spirit has made it easier. She wasn't awesome at potty training, but that was my own fault and I'm sure that's exactly what she wants me to type up about her eighth birthday-that potty training wasn't easy! Oh dear.

We have our battles. She pushes me to my yelling point and I make her cry but those are actually pretty far between. I get the eye rolls as I point out that she hasn't done her homework or chores, but she does them.

Siena at eight.

-She's a great reader. I'm not sure if she loves to read, but she does read chapter books with ease.
-She has started to take care of her sisters and prove that she's going to be ready to babysit soon.
-She loves school and cracks me up because she generally has sloppy handwriting because she is trying to get stuff done quickly and as fast as she can.
-She loves to play with friends even though I'm not so great at setting up "playdates"
-She is starting to really get the piano. I'm attempting to teach her myself which probably isn't smart.
-You can feel the shift of growing up happening. She doesn't play as well with her younger cousins. She's older. She's more mature and it's really starting to show. She's more the caretaker.
-Thanks to Aunt Becca's influence, she loves music videos and dancing to them.
-She still enjoys drawing and painting and coloring.
-She has grand plans for becoming famous through art or TV shows...she's going to win a dancing show or a cooking show or a singing show, etc.
-I can hear her blowing and popping bubbles with her gum which means she knows how and I think that's a recent development.

She really is a great kid. I think I say it at every single one of my kids birthdays, but I really feel inadequate at expressing how awesome she is when it comes to putting it down on paper.

My favorite phrase from her came via another Mom who had just moved into our neighborhood. They have a daughter Siena's age and Siena hit it off with her right away. While we were in Cancun, Siena happened to eat dinner at their house and when the Mom placed some spinach on her plate she asked her if she likes salad. Siena's response? "I'm just not that in to spinach." HAHAHA! Love it.

Cancun Part 3

Our last three days in Cancun were much more chill. We checked out one of the public access beaches Playa Delfines. It had much less sargassum than other beaches and this is still what it looked like! Luckily, off to the sides of the big patch there was plenty of open water. 

And hey, it had these giant coke bottles!

We got pretty sunned that morning so we chose to spend the afternoon and evening watching TV and reading at our apartment. It was glorious. We truly relaxed for 7 hours before going to bed.

On Thursday, we decided to check out the Mayan museum that had Maya Ruins that was directly on Hotel Zone. You would never know we were right beside huge hotels and lots of people!

Pete broke the rules and ran up the palace steps. We felt like such rebels.

We tried a different beach spot on Hotel zone...this one was called Playa Ballenas even less sargassum but killer waves that were unpredictable and not fun to swim in. But we felt like we had the ocean and beach to ourselves!

Friday was our last full day in Cancun. By this point, we were getting pretty concerned about the amount of sun exposure our skin was experiencing and were missing those girlies back home. We still decided to make the most of it.

Here I am officially 31 weeks pregnant!

We both decided that our favorite day had been at Isla de Mujeres so we headed back. This time we didn't rent a golf cart, but decided to just soak up the beach. Pete was still in head stand and handstand mode.

We ventured to Playa Norte this time and rented lounge chairs with an umbrella. It was a bit expensive when it was all said and done after drinks and lunch, but so worth it. The shade was important and we loved swimming out into the ocean and coming back to rest.

We only got about 2 and a half hours before a storm started to roll in. Most days that we had been in Cancun storms seemed to circulate all around, but never encompassing all of the sky and never lasting long. This time it was different. The clouds covered everything.

We checked out the reef one more time, but the lightening out in the distance over the water was very unnerving and it was hard to just relax so we didn't stay long.

I mentioned before that our hotel/condo was in a residential area. This made it expensive to take taxis so we started walking in the mornings to catch a bus or even just to get to the ferry for the island. On our final walk home, it started to rain and then pour. Luckily we had our beach towels with us, but we were quite surprised at the soaking we got. It didn't quite cool us off, but we were a little chilly than normal when we finally arrived home.

We spent the night watching Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy as we had the last two nights and it was cozy and enjoyable to spend our last night just the two of us. It was grand. We had a blast and sweat more than I think Pete thought possible over the last week.

By Saturday morning, we were both really ready to be done and back home. We missed America and fully understanding the system of how things worked and not spending weird amounts of money on water and we missed our kiddos. I cried getting on the plane in Cancun because I was so excited to be with my girls. We will of course have to see how long I go before I wish for a moment away from them again.

I love traveling with Pete. He is so easy going and truly my best friend. It never feels like a hassle and we generally enjoy each other's company. We rarely run out of things to talk about and I can't wait to see what the next 10 years has for us.

Cancun Part 2

Monday and Tuesday were our big adventure days!

On Monday, we took a tour to the ruins Tulum and the snorkel park Xelha. So fun. So hot. And so far away. We left our house at 7:30 am and weren't back until 7:30 pm.

Tulum is one of the only Mayan ruins on the coast. I had been there 12 years ago, but the access and changed quite a bit.

The beach access was mostly gone and because of the aforementioned sargassum problem it wasn't very pretty. We still explored a little bit.

Xelha was a much welcomed water adventure. I believe the water comes from a river and so it was just a little cooler and felt amazing. We took time to snorkel and look inside the caves.

We also floated the river and Pete jumped off the Cliff of Courage more than once. I opted not to test out how safe that was in pregnancy. We also discovered that they had a manatee sanctuary. We caught this manatee just as he took a breath, but I wasn't fast enough with the camera!

Tuesday we took the ferry over to Isla de Mujeres and rented a golf cart.

We discovered a sea turtle farm essentially. They had full grown sea turtles, baby sea turtles, kid turtles, and adolescent turtles. It was cool. I desperately wanted to pick up the babies.

We drove to the southern tip of the island...

Took pictures with the goddess of abundance and fertility...

And then plunked down on the beach. We really loved these beaches. Only minor waves and no sargassum.

We actually discovered a reef on the north tip of the island that looked like only locals every checked out. We loved it. The fish were swimming all around us.

Mom and Dad do Cancun!

Guest post by Mom:

This year Pete and I celebrated our 10 year anniversary. I wanted to do something kind of big and so in March I booked a trip to Cancun for a whole week in mid September. I then found out I was pregnant. Oh well! I didn't mean to be quite so pregnant on this trip, but luckily I have had a very uneventful pregnancy with only a skin irritation as my biggest complaint.

I consider myself VERY lucky to have such wonderful family that lives in our same city. It really wouldn't have been so easy to take off from my three girlies without my sisters and Mom.

Pete and I drove to Vegas at 7:30 am on Saturday the 12th. This was only stressful because my sister, Becca, who was to be the main caretaker for the week, was competing in her first triathlon that morning and then both of my big girls had their first soccer games later! Luckily, it all went pretty smoothly. We dropped the girls off with a very tearful farewell between me and Siena and Cara. I was pretty shocked at how much they cried, but I'm pretty sure none of us were crying even 5 minutes later.

We sent obligatory selfies of us getting on planes

And they sent us the happy faces of the cheerleaders at the triathlon.

We spent all of Saturday traveling. We flew from Vegas to Phoenix and then Phoenix to Cancun. It all went nice and smooth. Our layovers seem to be the perfect length and we arrived in the dark in Cancun despite the fact that it was only 7 pm. The humid heat just hung on us, but we eventually made our way to our hotel/condo Coral Mar on a VERY quiet dead end residential street. We were a fair distance away from Hotel Zone which eventually created some unique travel situations, but we were pretty pleased with our unit. It had a full kitchen and a separate bedroom and a great bathroom.

Sunday found us checking out the beaches on Hotel Zone. Technically, we were traveling at the peak of hurricane season which I think means that it was really off season for the tourists. There were plenty of people there, but you could tell that it was only about 50 % off the people you might expect. Also the ocean was experiencing a weird phenomenon with a sea plant called sargassum which was EVERYWHERE. It was kind of off putting.

Pete has started doing yoga on a regular basis during the week which led to a minor obsession with headstands while we were there.

It was quite hot and by about 2 pm we were ready to go find the local Wal-mart and head back to our apartment. That was quite the experience, but we really appreciated having food at the house especially for breakfasts. Like I said, we were off the beaten path.

We wound down the day by reading lagoon-side and just enjoying each other's company.

To be continued....