Busy, busy!

I do feel bad about not posting since our cruise a few weeks ago, but I have been staying busy here and traveling too.

The weekend after the cruise, Matt and I drove to Seaside for a mini-vacation with my family. Sunday was the 5K and half marathon that Erik, Lisa, Nick and Dad were running. Erik did the half and the others did the 5K. I love seeing my nieces together. They are so cute! They have a great time together and it's fun to watch them. The ladies got to go home with new Vera Bradley bags that the men got for completing the race. Here are a LOT of pictures from the weekend:

I had a week of work after Seaside and then I took a group of 7th graders and many of their parents to Seacamp down in Big Pine Key. They have a lot of fun and the instructors are great with the kids. The weather and water temperature, unfortunately, did not cooperate and it was pretty cold. We left early Monday morning and got back late Wednesday night, so there weren't many students at school Thursday. Here are some pictures so you can see where I was:

Last weekend we went to St. Pete. The real reason was for Jill's baby shower, but we love going to see family. Jonathan was at my parent's house Friday night and was able to let us in. We stayed up and talked to him and mom for a while and then headed off to bed. We had breakfast with Jonathan and mom Saturday morning and then headed to Mimi and Gramps' house to have lunch with them, Monet, Gary and Mark because we won't see them at Easter because we aren't going down this year. Lisa, Kayleigh and Brian showed up at mom and dad's house a little while after we got home and then Barbara, Jack and Grandma came over for dinner. It was great of mom to have so many people over because it's hard to get to talk to everyone when we are down for the holidays. This was a nice, quiet meal for us. Sunday we headed to Tampa and had brunch with Jim and Jean. I was starting to think we weren't going to see them because plans kept changing. I left from their house to go to Jill's shower and Matt, Jim and Jean went to his cousin Heather's to see her new baby girl. Jill's shower was very nice, but I would expect nothing less of the hostesses, Mrs. Brandes and Mrs. James. The family was there and I got to see Chat who just returned from her vacation in North Carolina with the kids. I really wanted to get a picture of Grandma, Barbara, Jill, Mom, Chat, Lisa and me. I thought about it when Jill was opening presents and then didn't think about it again until I was half way out of the neighborhood and most had already left.

Here are some pictures from Jill's shower:

Here are a couple of pictures of Brian and Kayleigh. Sunday morning Lisa, Kayleigh and I went to Old Navy. Kayleigh found a penny, so we went to the fountain so she could throw it in.

Here is a video of Kayleigh dancing in Old Navy:

30th Birthday Cruise

I feel bad saying that I never thought about blogging about the cruise until I saw that Lisa blogged about it. I guess I figured I talked to pretty much everyone about it, so I didn't think about writing about it. Here we go! Thursday Lisa was driving over to pick me up so we could ride together and only have to pay for parking for 1 car. Mapquest said that it would only add 10 minutes to her drive, so it made sense to do. I discovered that our Powershot camera's flash doesn't work. It had stopped working before, but after charging the battery it was up and running. Not that day. Matt told me I could go buy a new camera, so I basically just bought the newest version of our old camera. The great part was that it was on sale! Anyway, Lisa arrived around 10:45 and we were back on the road shortly after. We stopped for lunch, which is unfortunate, because there was free food on the boat. As I was standing in line to check in, I heard someone call my name and Polly and Jana were just a few people behind us in line. They gave each girl a tote bag with their initial embroidered on it and filled it with goodies. Alison and Molly weren't too far behind and soon we were on the boat leaving Port Canaveral. At dinner, the waiters all danced to "Apple Bottom Jeans". Let's just say that none of us can get it out of our heads!

Friday
We all got up and had breakfast together and then hung out until we docked in Nassau. We had lunch on the ship so we didn't have to pay for food or get caught in the rush to get off. We took a taxi to the Atlantis hotel. It is nice inside. We didn't gamble, but we got a lot of money out of the cash machine! :) After walking around the public areas of the hotel, including part of the aquarium, we headed over to the beach. I am still regretting not getting a massage on the beach like Alison did, but the girls quickly decided that I did not earn the decisiveness superlative the teachers bestowed upon me in high school. When the sun was getting low and the shadows getting long, we headed back to Atlantis and wandered through the pool areas (even though were weren't supposed to because it was just for guests). They have a bunch of different pools and aquatic animal areas. We were finally stopped and directed to the exit. We took a taxi back to the port and walked around the shops for a while. It was a great day to have the late seating for dinner because we didn't have to rush back on board to get ready for the formal dinner. The waiters all sang together that night. Not as fun as their dancing. After dinner we went and heard people karaoke, but none of us got in on the action.

Saturday I think we all slept in later than we thought we would. Lisa and I had an interior room, so we had no sunlight to give us a clue as to what time it was. We claimed beach chairs on the upper deck and then went to eat breakfast. We laid out for a couple of hours and then headed for the workout room. We got in some cardio and were going to do an ab workout, but we got kicked out for a seminar. Polly and Jana have great timing. I was just showing Lisa an exercise and they happened to walk in as we were lying getting ready to work. It started raining after lunch, but it was getting cold out on the deck with the wind blowing. We rested a little before dinner. That night the waiters danced to "Jai Ho" from the movie "Slumdog Millionaire". I haven't seen the movie, but I liked the song. We were all pumped up and headed to the dance club to get our groove on. After we got in our pj's we hung out until 2:30 AM. I know we were all really tired and thinking about our drives home, but it was still hard to go to bed knowing that it was our last night.

Sunday
It was a quick morning. We opted to carry our bags off the ship, which would have been a lot easier if they opened up the second line earlier in the process. We were off and in the car by 8:15, though, so it was pretty smooth. Lisa visited long enough to put pictures from my camera on a CD as well as waiting to burn 2 music CD's. She was back on the road by 11:45. I definitely needed a nap in the afternoon! It was a great trip and I'm so glad we did it.