Caribbean Cruise Vacation

So Zac and I have wanted to go on a vacation with just the two of us for as long as we have been married. Our special all-inclusive week long honeymoon in Cancun got canceled due to a hurricane. We were pretty bummed about it, but Zac's aunt was gracious enough to let us stay at her hacienda on the Cabo side of Mexico instead, and we had a ton of fun. However, we were still bummed we didn't get to do our really cool trip, and we have been talking about doing a cruise sometime as our cool trip. We threw the idea around for a long time, but when we finally found out that we were expecting a baby we decided to make that dream a reality because our time to go on a trip with just the two of us was rapidly coming to a close. So we finally got around to finding the right cruise and finding a steal of a deal. We decided we wanted to go to the Caribbean and we were hoping to go in August around our two year anniversary, but between Zac's soccer games, and golf tournaments we couldn't go until October. Plus since October is the off season for cruising in the Caribbean it was a great deal. We picked a 6 night cruise that went to Key West, FL; Georgetown, Grand Cayman; and Ocho Rios, Jamaica on the Carnival Freedom. It was only like $800 for the both of us! Plus a couple months ago when coming back from a golf tournament Zac offered to take a later flight and so Southwest credited him $300, and my mom gave us a free ticket, so it ended up only costing us $100 for airfare. It was awesome to get such an awesome vacation for such an awesome deal!

Our trip started on Saturday Oct. 17 when we flew from San Jose to Ft. Lauderdale. We had to leave super early and it took all day, and we both looked absolutely beautiful by the time we reached Florida, as you can tell:

We were a little surprised when we got there and it was really overcast, but it was still very warm. We knew to expect rain while we were in the Caribbean in October, but we hoped the rain would cooperate, and for the most part it did. We only got one day of rain the whole trip.
That night we stayed at a very nice luxurious resort know as the Days Inn. Okay so it wasn't 5 stars or anything but it offered a free shuttle from the airport to the hotel and a free shuttle the next day from the hotel to the cruiseport, and it was cheap and that was enough for us. That night we went down to the beach and had dinner at a cute little restaurant. We listened to live music while we ate fajitas and afterwards we walked along the beach for a while. The water was still so warm even late at night. Zac wanted to go swimming in it, but I pointed out that we didn't have our swimsuits on. This of course gave Zac another idea, which I promptly turned down becuase even though it was dark, there were still enough people on the beach that could see :)

SUNDAY- boarding the cruise

We were able to get on the boat at noon. We got through customs, and all the cruise check in stuff, and finally got on and found our room. We got some lunch then it was time for our muster drill. This is where we report to our muster station and learn what to do in the unlikely event that we needed to evacuate the ship. And I'm sure in that unlikely event we would all calmly find our assigned muster station. Rrrriiiiggghhtttt. Then we went out on deck to watch us leave port. Zac was particularly excited since this was his first cruise, and I was excited to see Zac's excitement since this was my sixth cruise. We enjoyed a very nice steak dinner, and then a show in the lounge. After that we explored every part of the ship. So cool! We both enjoyed the drawing room and the library and of course, the lounge. We finished off the night by watching the Falcons vs Bears game on the outdoor big screen on the top deck while we played in the swimming pool.

MONDAY- Key West, FL





It was beautiful, sunny and the perfect temperature when we arrived in Key West.

Here is a picture of our cruise ship.

The first place we saw when we got off the boat was this cool museum that had really realistic life size statues everywhere outside. This statue was a guy who was painting a picture of the other statues.

Here are the statues that guy was painting. They were some weird naked ladies with a guy looking up, so Zac decided to have a look see too.

We walked around the town and explored a little before we decided to ride scooters to some of the historical sites. However the scooter guy could tell I was pregnant (guess I wasn't hiding it well) and said I couldn't ride a scooter, but I could ride a bike (I'm not sure why a bike is so much safer, but whatever). So we decided to ride bikes. Then we discovered they had tandem bikes, and we had never ridden a tandem bike before so we decided to do that. It turned out to be a lot of fun, and I'm really glad we did it, it was probably even better than scooters.

We went to a couple of historical sites on the island. The first place we went was the southern most part of the island, which is also the southern most point of the USA. Then we found an historic Lighthouse.

Then we went to Ernest Hemingway's home. It was interesting and we learned stuff about this gifted man, and his rather tragic life. I especially enjoyed all the Hemingway cats. Hemingway had like 50 cats when he lived there, and the trust that maintains the the home has kept the descendants of his cats on the property and continues to care for them. This little black cat is named Charlie Chaplin and he was so cute!

Then we went to the Harry Truman Little White House. This was where President Truman liked to come on vacation while he was president. It was informational and we learned a bit more about Harry Truman and some of the historical events that happened in the house.

After that we went to a little cemetery. We heard there were some funny sayings on some of the tombstones, like 'At Least I Know Where He's Sleeping Tonight' and stuff like that, but we couldn't find any of these tombs. We did notice that a bunch of the tombstones had these Masonic symbols on them:Zac had been reading the new Dan Brown book that deals with Masons so he was pretty excited and intrigued by this, thus the picture.

After that we took the bikes back, and did a little shopping. Then we found a little shop selling key lime pie, and so we stopped for some key lime pie in Key West.

Then we got back on the ship and went to dinner. When we came back, we found our first towel animal. So cute!

TUESDAY- at sea

There were tons of activities going on on the boat, so we had plenty to keep us busy all day. One of the things we did was a trivia game and Zac actually won so he got this cool little "ship on a stick" trophy.

It was also our first formal night so we got to get all dressed up and go to dinner and a cool singing and dancing show.

They had a bunch of stations set up to have your picture taken at, and we actually went to like 10 of them, but we didn't buy any of them because they were like 10 bucks a piece. Heck no! So our cheap pictures will have to do.

When we got back we found our second little towel animal. I love this picture of Zac, it's so cute!

WEDNESDAY- Georgetown, Grand Cayman

The last two times I've been to the Cayman Islands I went to Stingray City with Captain Marvin's tour group, and I decided to take Zac back to Stingray City again, because it was such a cool experience.

We got to do some snorkeling and see some cool fish and pretty coral, and of course we got to hold and kiss wild stingrays!

After dinner we found our next towel animal, and so appropriately it was a stingray (this is me being a fish by the way).

THURSDAY- Ocho Rios, Jamaica

The first thing we decided to do was take a taxi to Dunn's River Falls.

You actually walk up this series of waterfalls. It was really cool and beautiful!

Try not to pay too much attention to my pregnant belly. I realize it is not very attractive, plus none of my swimsuits really fit anymore, so I was kind of limited in what I could wear. When we first discussed this trip, I imagined myself being skinny and looking really hot. I was going to workout and everything!

Needless to say once I became pregnant the skinny option disappeared, and I pretty much gave up on the idea of working out. Oh well!

Once we got to the top we had to take our picture with the sign congratulating us for making it.

FRIDAY- at sea

We spent most of the day on deck reading and riding the water slide. We actually got a bit of sun this day, and got pretty sunburned. At least it was the last day and not the first day. It was very relaxing and a great way to spend our last day.

Dinner that night was our last formal night, both in purple, so cute!
We also went to an art auction that night and learned a lot about high end art and the kinds of people who buy it. Some of the stuff was going for over $100,000!

SATURDAY- fly home

Well all good things must come to an end. We were pretty sad to leave, but I guess we had to come back at some point. It was really great to go on a real trip with just us, although if I had already had the baby and we left her at home with family she would have been less "with us" than she was. I took her everywhere! At least at this point she didn't need to be fed or changed or take a nap or anything :)

We had a really great time on our trip! We did so much fun stuff - from comedy shows to warm Carribean waters to games to simply relaxing in the pools. If you thought this blog post was long you didn't even get half of it. I loved that I was able to spend quality time like this with Zac. It was really great to spend so much time with my best friend. We had so much fun, we got totally spoiled and we are so not ready to go back to the "real world."

20 Weeks: Half Way Today!

Yea I have made it half way through the pregnancy! Wow I can honestly say these past 4 1/2 months have... absolutely dragged by! (bet you thought I was going to say "flew by"-unless of course you have had a baby then you are probably not that surprised) I stop and think, "wow, it has only been 4 1/2 months? It feels like freaking forever!" And when I think about it even more I realize that I have only known I was pregnant for 3 1/2 months, now that makes looking ahead to the next 4 1/2 more months that much more daunting.

Oh well. I haven't been too miserable for the most part. I got sick about 3 weeks ago and realized that all doctors want pregnant women to be miserable because they don't want lawsuits. Every single cough syrup said to see a doctor before taking- and of course no doctor wants to tell you its okay. Actually my nurse did recommended a few that were okay to take, but said to only take the smallest dose before bed to try and limit the amount I took, and to just take a few Tylenol throughout the day. Needless to say I was downright miserable for a week- no NyQuil! But I recovered, I am resilient, imagine that.

Also I have discovered that nobody wants you to have fun when you are pregnant. We went on a cruise last week (that will be my next post... stay tuned for more on that later) and almost every activity was "no pregnant women" allowed. No para-sailing, horseback riding, scooter riding, hot tub, water slide, bobsled roller coaster, or pretty much anything exciting. (By the way the hot tub was only luke warm so I got in for a little bit, and I did the water slide 4 or 5 times just to show that sign next to the slide telling me- the pregnant lady- to keep off, that I don't give a rat's furry tush about it or it's lame warning). All the other stuff we really couldn't do, there were people involved and they could all tell that I was clearly pregnant and so they said, "no way." Whatever. Everyone tells you the fun stops when you have a kid, apparently it stops before the kid even gets here. But really- we did other things, and we still had a ton of fun!

Anyway for those of you out there who may have secretly longed for the day I would truly look fat, you are in luck, that day has come. For your viewing pleasure I give you: I think I have now officially reached that point where people stop wondering, "Is she? or isn't she?" As you know I am a substitute teacher in high school and you can always count on teenagers to tell you what they think. About 4 weeks ago I got a tentative question or two beating around the bush to ask if I was pregnant. Now kids I have never seen before come up to me and ask, "how far along are you?" or my favorite as I'm passing out papers, "oh! Your belly is so cute!" And both of these statements are posed before anyone has asked to make sure I am actually pregnant. However the best is when a 10th grader asks me how far along I am, then tells me she is 6 months, and asks if I know what I am having yet. So far this year I have seen at least 5 pregnant girls all in 10th grade and all 5 months or further along. All I can say is, "Wow."

Anyway, I have put on about 7 pounds which means I no longer fit into any of my pants. Yippee! So I have now gone up a bra size as well as a pant size. Fun! The doctor said normal weight gain should be about a pound a month for the first 20 weeks then a pound a week for the next 20, which would put you at about the recommended 25 pounds. Well at 7 I guess that puts me 3 pounds over what I should be at, but I'm going to say that's still normal so I don't damage my self esteem too much.

Well enough of me and my fat self, here are some pictures of the baby:

The head is off to the right, and in the middle that is either a hand or a foot, I personally think it looks more like a foot, but its where the hand should be, so take your pick. By the way our baby does have all the normal parts and they are all in their proper place, I assure you this is just an odd picture. By the way, that is the leg on the left. I think the baby looks pretty squished in this picture, but the ultra sound tech said there should still be plenty of room in there. Next, for those of you who have not heard the news yet, and are still wondering as to the gender of our baby; this picture has a handy little arrow pointing right between the legs from the bottom up, and if you look very closely you will probably see... nothing. So yes after a few very good looks, with the baby was cooperating perfectly, the ultrasound tech was fairly convinced by the lack of any obvious male genitalia to pronounce with confidence (although he refused to assign an actual % number to his confidence) that we are having a girl. We are both happy and excited- although we had mostly boy names picked out if that gives you any indication as to what we were originally hoping for. However, as Zac points out to me on occasion (more so when we were first dating) that I know nothing about boys and how they work because I don't have any brothers. And I won't lie, that is absolutely true, I won't dispute it, I would have absolutely no idea what to do with a boy. I am the Sunbeams teacher and I have one little boy in my class, and he needed to go to the bathroom one day, and I will have to say I was very little help, I have no idea what to do. Alas, I would probably tell our little boy (if we ever have one) to wipe after he pees, which Zac tells me is a big, NO. Guys just don't do that! Well for now we are happy to have a girl and hopefully someday we will have a boy and I will learn the full extent of my ignorance when it comes to the male gender.

This picture is actually somewhat creepy (and yes I do feel guilty saying my daughter looks creepy) but it is just due to the nature of ultra sounds obviously that this picture looks more like an alien than a human being. That is her head on the right hand side and I believe she is facing the camera (again what a cooperative baby! she obviously takes after me :) ) Also if you look carefully on the left side you can see her very healthy little heart. The doctors have never had a problem finding her heartbeat, even from 8 weeks old, and they say it sounds very healthy.

The next question we get after, "do you know what you are having?" is, "do you have a name picked out?" Short answer, no. We have some names that we are considering, but we aren't completely sold on any name we have found yet. Here is our list so far of names we are considering. We would love input or suggestions- not that we will honor all advice or suggestions :) -but we would love it none the less- seriously!

Addison

Boston

Brooklyn

Chloe

Isabel/ Isabella

Kennedy

Kenley/ Makenley

Kinley/ Mckinley

London

Mackenzie

Madison

Mckenna

Siena

Vienna

So that's the update. If you skipped all the other writing and just looked at the pictures, here it is in a nutshell. I am fat, I now look pregnant, we are having a girl, she appears to be very healthy and we don't have a name picked out yet.

Zac's Golf Tournament

On September 12 Zac played in his company golf tournament. The tournament was held at Coyote Creek Golf Course; a course near San Jose that was actually designed by Jack Nicklaus (who I'm told was a "pretty sweet pro golfer"). He was in a group of 3 other guys that he goes golfing with a lot: Chris Mitchem, Casey Trubo, and Chris Niro. They had a good time and actually did very well! In fact they won first place!!! This is Zac's second tournament this summer, and he has won both! I'm so proud of him. Zac golfed like crazy right before the tournament to get ready for it, but since the tournament he has taken it easy and focused on soccer. His soccer team was top of the league in the regular season and has played in the playoffs all the way to the championship game - which will take place this Thursday. Zac is pretty confident they will win the championship and claim the coveted T-shirt that the winners get. I'll keep you posted. Back to the golf tourney: Zac had a great time and he did awesome! I am so proud of him! (Side note: I personally like that someone took this series of pictures of Zac as he is teeing up and taking a shot. Zac says this shot ended up being a slice and he blames it on the fact that someone was taking a ba-zillion pictures of him as he was trying to focus. But I say if you want to go pro you better get use to the the pressure!)

Here is Zac and Casey hanging out in the golf cart.

The winning team: Mitchem, Zac, Casey, and Niro.

Labor Day Weekend

Yes I realize that Labor Day was almost a whole month ago; however, I am lazy, and since I am pregnant, I will say it's justified. If I have to get fat and feel sick then I feel I deserve to use the pregnancy as an excuse for all my short comings. :)

Anyway for Labor Day we decided to go to Monterey and ride bikes. Since our bikes were stolen right off our patio and we haven't bought new bikes yet we had to rent some when we got there. We found a nice place and rented two bikes for half a day. However we realized that with how much it costs to rent a bike, we could just buy a new bike for the same cost as 2 or 3 full days of renting. So maybe we do need to just break down and buy some new bikes and get more use out of them!

The bikes were really nice, and actually very comfortable. However, since it has been forever since I've been on a bike I got sooooooo sore! Zac is a lot tougher than me, so he only mentioned that he was slightly uncomfortable, whereas I was almost in tears by the end of the ride!

When we got to Monterey we first had lunch at our favorite little restaurant, Louie Linguini's. Then we rented our bikes and set out to bike 17 mile drive. Of course we had to bike 5 miles or so just to get to where 17 mile drive started. So that added another 10 or so miles to the round trip.

The scenery was beautiful as always, and the weather was perfect! We couldn't have asked for a better day!

It was sunny and clear and the weather was cool enough that we didn't get hot while biking and warm enough we could wear short sleeves (usually it's kind of cool and overcast when we visit Monterey).

Of course Zac needed a picture in front of a golf course! I believe this is Spanish Bay Golf Course.

This is Spy Glass Golf course behind me.

This is the Lone Cypress tree out at the end of 17 mile drive.

We biked out to Pebble Beach and got a soda and ice cream as a reward for making it to the end. We sat and talked to a very nice (and slightly eccentric) older gentleman who told us his story of how he made it rich in the balloon business. After that we turned around and biked the 17+ miles back.

We saw this house along the way right near Pebble Beach and we thought it was so beautiful so we stopped to snap a picture. How rich do you think you would have to be to own this house? Oh very rich my friend, very, very rich. The person who owns this house is very lucky.

So about 1/2 way back I had to stop and I wasn't sure I could keep going! My butt hurt so bad, but even more than that my legs had cramped up so badly I wanted to cry! I pushed myself to finish, and Zac was surprisingly supportive (if the roles had been reversed I think I may have taken the opportunity to tease him) but Zac was very supportive and genuinely felt bad for me, so that motivated me to keep going.

So some 44 miles and 4 hours later we arrived back at Bay Bikes to return our bikes. I was so sore and my cramped legs continued to plague me the whole drive back, but as soon as I got home I took a couple of Tylenol and took a warm bath to soak my legs and I felt much much better! All in all the trip was a ton of fun and I am so glad we went! It was a beautiful day, I actually really enjoy biking (we just need to do it a bit more often so I'm not so out of shape), and it was great to get some good ole' fashion exercise (like I said, I've been lazy lately so I haven't been getting much of that in general).

If you've never biked 17 mile drive we would definitely recommend it! We had a great day off work!