Vacations can be fun!

It seems like years ago that we packed up and cruised the Caribbean. In fact it was four months ago. Sheesh time flies. I was looking through photos to work on our post adoption report (which is also late, argh) and realized I have yet to put down on 'paper' the cheers and challenges of our fabulous vacation.

Our family cruises together. For us it makes a great vacation for the group. There are always logistics and itineraries to work through but we always seem to end up with good times and good memories. This being our first cruise with a toddler, I stepped up with a request for the Caribbean. Figuring that if we missed a port, it wouldn't be too much of a bummer. We still got to partake of the cooking class, a family favorite. Also had some fun trying my dancing skills with the "Dancing with the Stars" competition. Didn't win but had fun anyway. It's harder than it looks! Of course we only had about 20 minutes to learn a dance then perform it. I got to have an hour at the pool with a book. It was a glorious hour though. Lots of time by the ship's pool with Katy too.

The trip started great! Katy and I left the day before, planning the plane trip around nap time and indeed she slept most of the way. I figured out how to manage Katy in the stroller while wheeling two big suitcases with another on top. It's amazing how little people will notice you when you are struggling to get from here to there. We stayed at a hotel near the port for one night and had a nice evening of playground and walking and dinner. Ok so she only ate crackers and ketchup but at least she was happy about it!

The next morning we hauled all of our belongings to the port and met up with Aunt Susan and Uncle Erik.

We introduced Katy to the Lido deck buffet where she took to it quite well! The girl does love to cut things up.

First stop was Half Moon Cay, a private island owned by the cruise line. Best. beach. ever. The sand was soft and when mixed with water was very glurch-like, which for Katy was a huge hit. Ba-lurch!!! They served a great buffet and the weather was amazing. The souvenir shopping was dismal. Maybe in my next life I'll move here and make some kind of local knickknack that people will pay oodles of cash for and I'll count my pile of money on the beach every day. sigh.

Katy loved playing in the water with Uncle Erik. He makes a good dolphin to ride!

That night we had a nice family dinner in the dining room. Katy was still happy and having a good time. On the way to dinner we stopped at the Ocean bar to listen to some music and while away the time with some shuffling.

At this point I was still optimistic that this would be the perfect vacation. hmmmm

The next stop was Cayman Islands, where Katy and I went on a bus tour with Papa. We stopped in Hell to see what that was all about and got our passports stamped. So now, Katy's first passport stamp is Hell. I don't know why I think that's funny but I do. On a side note, her passport was freshly minted about 24 hours before the plane departed due to some major drama getting it approved. I'll tackle that in the 'getting Katy's citizenship papers done' post to come.

We also stopped at the dolphin center and watched them jump and splash. (look, there's proof that I was there too!)

The last stop on the tour was the beach. It wasn't actually a stop, really, because everyone kept going on to the pier. I was determined to get Katy on every beach so we stayed behind and caught a taxi later. The taxi dropped us off at the north pier and we had to walk to the south pier. Maybe three blocks? Not so bad unless you consider it was probably 90 degrees and I was carrying a 35lb sleeping child. I wish I had a photo of the line to get on the ship. It was at least a block long. It wasn't until just before boarding that someone let us slip ahead and get on board. Good gravy I thought my biceps would burst. Turns out that was what would happen on most of our trips back to the ship. I liked that she was napping, but we needed to figure out a better system.

That night we started to get 'the face'. Sensory overload was kicking in and the change of routine and lack thereof was stealing the smile from my happy girl. To get in some down time we watched a lot of movies. Need to know any quotes from Despicable Me, Monsters Inc or Cars 2? Cause I've got em! All of them. Over and over again. Oh boy, here we go...

The next day it was Mahogany Bay in Honduras. It was 104 degrees and sunny sunny sunny. We went to the beach for a short stay and then headed back to the ship for resting and movies.

Holland America cruise line may not be known for it's catering to kids but they did have Club Hal, which we found to be quite nice. The first week we almost had the place to ourselves. The second week there were more kids but many of them were older. Still, it was a good place for Katy to feel more like at home. They did many of the same activities that she does at daycare, which helped I think. They had a pizza making night and she loved it! There's the smile I remember! 

The next stop was Costa Maya, Mexico. We were figuring out the right balance of routine vs engagement in cruising activities for a toddler. Smiles were still not always at the ready but they were around. Katy loved drumming with the musicians on shore. We walked around with Nana and Papa in the 'pop-up town' but didn't make it into the real town. Learning to limit our activities. Slowly but surely I'm learning!

This was the closest we got to a beach at this stop.

I was still trying to keep Katy engaged in the family activities by bringing her to dinner. Silly silly me. Poor thing was trying to keep up but it wasn't in her. At least the chair seemed mostly comfortable for sleeping. :-(

Finally, I'm getting smart and we nix dinner with the family. We stop messing around and make a schedule and stick to it. So much less drama that way. Morning breakfast in the cabin, off to Club Hal for Katy and on shore for me. Then I come back, pick up Katy and head to the beach. We have lunch and head back to the ship. She falls asleep on the way and stays asleep while I put her in bed and dry clothes. Then we get up and wander the ship for a while. Interestingly enough, Club Hal was open from 1 to 4 but then closed until 7. I guess they don't factor in the napping crowd. So after checking out the ship and sometimes the ship pool, we get Katy some dinner on the Lido deck. Pasta makes her happy. Simple pleasures, happy girls. Then Katy heads back to Club Hal so I can get some dinner with the family. Finally it's off to bed. Rinse and repeat.

Next stop is Grand Turk, where we stop at the beach briefly then head into the 'pop-up town' to play in the pool instead. Katy loved this pool and so did I. And since it wove all around the Margaritaville restaurant we could have lunch and still play in the pool. One stop shop. I love it. Back to the ship, nap, play, dinner etc...

Puerto Rico was the one place we didn't get our feet in the sand at all. (Costa Maya had sand and beach chairs in 'town'). Instead we walked around town with Nana, Papa, Susan and Erik, checked out the CVS for some Benedryl and played in the water fountain.

We did find the beach at St Maarten. Another beautiful stretch of sand. Wish I was there right now actually. Here, there was rum tasting. Well not for Katy of course but for the rest of us. Much rum tasting but for any more details you'd have to ask Erik. Oh wait, he won't remember them. Good times! :-)

Our last stop was Half Moon Cay again. Katy got to enjoy Club Hal in the morning and we took Papa on his first snorkeling adventure. There were so many fish it was like being in an aquarium! It was a bit choppy. Calmer than some places I've been but definitely had some swing to it. Still, I'd recommend it for the amount of fish we saw.

I couldn't resist getting Katy on shore so we took a quick dip before lunch and nap. How can you possibly pass this up?

Good times were had, drama was intense and lessons were learned. Overall we did really have more fun than not. Next time I'll know better what to do to make the vacation less dramatic for everyone who lived through Katy's drama both on board and the two weeks following during re-entry to real life (apologies to the daycare teachers!). And especially for Katy, who should get to remember vacations with mama as great and happy times. And yes, I realize she won't probably remember much if anything of this trip but I will and that counts for something.

Thanks for indulging in our vacation photo tour! Any tips for traveling with a toddler are accepted and encouraged!

Follow my blog with Bloglovin

Experimenting with our Easter eggs

I still have a beautiful post in the works to highlight our last vacation but it's taking a while to sort through all of the photos. Needless to say it will make you want to put your toes in the sand right then and there. At least it does for me. Stay tuned for that, but in the meantime...

We (well, I) wanted to try something new for coloring eggs this year. Mostly because I have to take quite a few deep breaths to have Katy dipping spoons into big bowls of staining colored vinegar water and it was too cold to do it outside like last year. She tends to not be the most gentle when it comes to stirring and dipping and I'm not ready to have colored kitchen furniture and flooring.

So, I scoured the internet for other ideas and landed on one that worked out great for us! Just to be safe we did it at Nana and Papa's house. LOL! There were many different variations on this theme but I like where our version landed.

First we assembled everything I thought we'd need. Plastic wrap, food coloring, coffee filters, vinegar and water mixed in a spray bottle and a big space covered in plastic. The sprinkles, stickers and markers were there for additional decoration, should the coloring not work as planned.

We used coffee filters instead of paper towels like most of the sites did. I guess I was thinking eggs are round, coffee filters are round, why not? I dampened them with the spray bottle (worst spray bottle ever in fact but then I was only out $1 when I tossed it after we were done).

We used the food coloring, dropping it onto the filter. I played art director and we stuck to only one or two colors per egg (I try really hard not to but sometimes I can't help it!). When sufficiently covered, I got the filter more damp with the d@&# spray bottle, put the egg in the center and rolled it up, trying to get all sides of the egg touching the colored parts. Katy liked every many drops and I was a bit more shy with mine but both ways worked out.

Each egg got rolled up in plastic wrap and put it's own bucket for 'marinating'. The cup wasn't really necessary but I did it because I brought the cups and by golly I was going to use them.

We tried two using her neon washable paint because I thought it might be more fun if everything was washable :-D but they didn't work out so well. Not too much color and then it all came off on my hands when the egg got some condensation on it. Oh well, at least it washed off easily!

Voila! The eggs are unwrapped to reveal a very cool pattern. Even the ones that I thought would be black from all of the drops of color were rich and colorful.

Here they are all together. Katy's are the more heavily covered ones and you don't really see all the definition of the fun color blends. She really like to use the green and blue. I mixed it up a bit and love all of them!

Unfortunately I don't have a final shot in a pretty plate setting with Easter grass and candy and whatnot but Easter plans got up-ended a little with Nana taking a few days off in the hospital. Everything is all right and she is fine (whew!) but fancy Easter plates got knocked off the list of things to do in the hustle. And, I found a fun use for the eggs so they got used up before the plating would have happened anyway. Look for that post coming soon!

How did you color your eggs this year?

For once, a post not about Katy or Riley!

Seriously, you have to see this movie if you have kids and even if you don't...

I thought I'd do a brief recap of my health, in case anyone is still wondering. After going through the whole breast cancer thing in 2009, I was all about the adoption and getting on with life. A few months after Katy came home, I was diagnosed with Stage IV metastatic breast cancer in my liver and lymph nodes. I mentioned it once briefly here but I'm not one to go on and on (unless it's about Katy or Riley, apparently). PS I should note here that my humor sometimes goes a bit onto the dark side so be warned.

Needless to say, the news was a game changer. This time around, it moves from 'cureable' to 'treatable as a chronic condition'. Yeah, one that will kill you. Super. I did chemo again, this time orally without having to lose my hair. Neato! I did have hand and foot syndrome, causing my palms and soles of my feet to get red, swollen and sore. Thankfully I didn't have it as bad as I have seen it to be and I'll gladly take that over losing my hair. Somehow that would have been too much to handle a second time.

November 2011 to May 2012 was a blur of doctor visits and exploring complementary treatments as well. My company was (and is) truly a magical place and gave me a leave of absence to heal. I found Pathways and tried many different classes, treatments and groups to help figure this sh!t out. If you're in the Minneapolis area and are ever in need, I would definitely recommend going there.

I came back to work in June, to a new position that didn't involve client meetings and intense scheduling/juggling. I'm happy that I can still contribute in a way that was needed and it's always fun to learn new things. Like many of my MBC sisters I've connected with, it's feels good to still feel like a productive member of society.

As of December, my tumors have graduated to 'stable'. Woot! The chemo did it's job and I mostly did ok with living and eating a healthy lifestyle. Ok, well some anyway. Man that's hard! There's no knowing how long this maintenance drug will keep working but I know there's an arsenal of other drugs to take once it does. I go to see the oncologist every three months to see if my tumors are still sleepy. So, if you catch me the week before, don't be surprised if I'm jittery, spacey and distracted. It's a roller coaster ride waiting for the crest of the hill. Every.three.months. But each good report means more time to soak in this great life. And I wouldn't trade it for anything.

The moral of this story is I'm not dying until I'm dead (thank you Valerie Harper) and let's just have fun while we can. Make hay while the sun shines and all that.

Are you making hay?

January and February goings-on

My little girl grows up so fast! For Christmas, Katy got a toddler bed from Nana and Papa. I thought the transition would be more difficult than it was. We set up the new bed in her room along with the crib. From day one, she was done sleeping in the crib. So, the next weekend the crib was out the door and onto the sidewalk for recycling/trash. This is the morning of that first night...

Katy sang and danced in her first stage performance at daycare. She was an acorn and an owl. Very funny!

We had another fun weekend with Evi and Rachel when they came to stay with us. We explored the Edinborough Park Adventure Peak playground. As per usual, Katy ran, slid and jumped for a bit then was more interested in snack time. Evi definitely got her money's worth out of the equipment :-)

We also went to our first performance at the Children's Theatre, The Biggest Little House in the Forest. The one woman puppet show enthralled the girls, it was so cute to see.

We explored sensory activities. Mixing baking soda, water and shaving cream to make fizzling, foamy fun.

We decorated the window for Valentine's Day. And while the girls are already fast friends...

they are still toddlers!

We can't wait until we see them again!

A few weeks later Valentine's Day arrived with a coating of fresh white snow.

Max and Adam came to visit. We watched Peter Pan. They were all very excited as you can see.

And because I didn't want Riley to feel left out, here's some proof that the old girl still has some puppy left in her.

If you're still with me, we're almost there! Passport drama and cruise photos coming up soon.

Three year photo shoot

Katy's annual photo shoot happened a bit later than I'd planned. We target her birthday but it didn't get coordinated until December. This year they were taken by Laura Monahan. We had a fun outing at the Como Zoo and Conservatory and even got Nana and Papa in some shots! Some day I will choose the prints for everyone's Christmas presents. :-)

What a good looking family (if I don't say so myself) LOL

Continuing on - Fall and Winter

Visits and holidays took up much of our fall and winter. I can't believe how much we managed to pack into those few months!

Katy kept busy at the YWCA with her new room, the Rainbow room. She started swimming lessons and had another outing to the apple orchard. I love to chaperone that every year. School pictures were taken in a dress of Katy's choosing and the sweater I made (and made her wear without much complaint).

Katy also started morning classes at Armatage school, with extra emphasis on speech and occupational therapy. It's amazing how much she's progressed since September! It is an early morning now for us as the bus comes to our driveway at 7am. Thankfully she loves it so much that even on vacation she was heard to say "I want to go home, I miss the bus".

We had a visit from my friend Kate and her family, partner Annie and daughter Maddie. All of us girls had a blast visiting Pine Tree apple orchard and Kate's old stomping grounds at the UofM. We had a dress up party with Katy's Ethiopian dresses and made some fun messes fixing breakfast and painting projects.

In October, Katy turned 3. I can't believe it seems like so long ago. We celebrated the day with Titi at our favorite restaurant Burger Jones.

 

The next weekend we had the birthday party with Katy's friends. I had grand ambitions for a medium-sized, medium-activity party and it went swimmingly! Thanks to all the moms and dads who helped make that happen :-) I couldn't decide on a theme and Katy wasn't forthcoming so we had Thomas the Train plates and napkins and Lego cupcakes and general party decoration. Katy didn't care much for the singing/candle blowing experience but she was happier than the picture shows.

My big idea was one I saw they had done at daycare. Big sheets of craft paper with their bodies outlined that they got to decorate from a big pile of markers, stampers, colored tape and stickers. We had great participation for a bunch of 2-4 year olds! As the kids had their pizza, the grownups cut them out and put them on the wall for the final picture. I think that might have been my favorite part, watching it all come together.

 

Next we went up to Superior to visit Evi and her mom Rachel. It was so fun to watch the girls have so much fun together. We both really enjoyed the whole weekend. We had dress up time, a marching band concert and glow stick/finger light disco dancing. We went to a corn maze, saw pumpkin lights at the Glensheen mansion and played at the Duluth Children's Museum. We know how to pack in the fun! As you can see by the last picture, we did our job tiring the girls out.

 

The obligatory halloween costume shot. She had bumblebee antennae but chose Riley's devil horns instead. It was nice that she walked this year but I'm excited for her to be able to take steps at faster than a snail's pace next year. And maybe next year she'll time her 'trick or treat' and 'thank you' for the doorway rather than the sidewalk.

Thanksgiving came on a warm day so Katy decided to dress in spectacular fashion for some outdoor fun. Then we headed to Nana and Papa's house and had a nice dinner with them and my aunt and uncle Mary and Boomer.

 Just had to include some backyard fun on the way to church one morning. I made this dress for summer but it didn't get done until it needed extra warmth underneath. Still cute I think! Maybe it will head to the state fair this year?

And finally for this long post, Christmas. For which, inexplicably I have no photos. I believe they were on the phone that got stolen. I thought I had downloaded them before the theft but sadly no. All I have is the logo and a shot from Disneyland that I can't get to upload. Needless to say we had a fun trip to California to stay with Aunt Susan and Uncle Erik. Disneyland, bell choir at the San Diego Zoo, a visit to the train museum, lots of food and presents!

Whew, we're getting there!