Sunday - Camp, Spa, and Deep Sea Fishing, and a Pleasant Surprise!

Well, we started off earlier today because Papa was going deep sea fishing. So we got them ready and had a quick breakfast and dropped them off at Camp at 8am instead of the usually 9:30ish.  Papa had to be in the lobby for 8:30am.  I dropped them off this morning and found myself alone for the morning. What to do?

I decided to head back to the room and take a nice LONG shower. It felt great. Then I grabbed my book and had a leisurely breakfast/brunch. All alone.  Then I went to get ready for my pedicure.  :0)  After the pedicure, I went to lounge on the hammock and got severely red. It was a hot day, and finally some good sunshine!  Stopped at the room to recover from the heat and found the cleaning lady ready to start our rooms. She asked me how the ant problem was.  I told her the closet was better but we know were the ants were coming from – the plug.  She watched as the tiny ants were coming out of the plug. YUPPERS!  She told me that she would contact the manager.  Sure, we did already, but okay.

After that, I decided to go for a sweet treat and wait for Martin to come back from his fishing trip. Which by the way, Papa caught 2 . Only 1 other person caught a fish.  Sadly the other 6 people didn't catch any. Papa was sure lucky that day!  Around 1pm he came walking with his new friend Steve. A nice family that we met when we arrived.  We sat around talking and eventually met up with his wife Leanne. We decided to have lunch together. It was really nice.  Then it was time for my facial.  :0P  Martin went back to the room and showered. He was going to pick up the kids and then take them to the pool.

As I was in the beginning of my facial told me that my husband wanted to talk to me. I panicked. Was everything okay?  Sure enough he knocks on the door.  Everything okay?  Well…it turns out the manager called and left a message that they wanted to move us out of the room and UPGRADE us. WHAT????  There was a bit of overexcitedness in Martin’s tone. Hahahhaha.  So I told him that we had to pack up all our stuff. Was it really worth it?

Old room picture

New room picture

Anyways…to make a long story short. We ended up moving to this room with OCEAN FRONT WALK OUT.  It is freakin amazing! Hahahahhaha  They didn’t have to because the problem was somewhat solved. They were so kind and generous. Not only is this room gorgeous, but it’s huge!  AND….personal concierge service!  Outrageous.  I felt like little country fold entering a whole new world of luxery even though we were just across the pool from the Italian Villas.

After we moved in to our new room, we got ready for a nice Italian dinner in our new area.  We  went to Mario's and had a fabulous risotto and the kids ate some yummy pasta. This restaurant was great because it had a special room with tons of Sesame Street characters along the wall and at the entrance. The kids loved it. To make it even more special, they had little chairs and tables for kids to eat at. We missed that but reminded ourselves to come back to have another meal  in that special kids room.

Anways…we are back inside our room after sitting outside in our patio.  William is asleep IN ANOTHER ROOM (check out the sliding door that separates the kids room and the adults room!).  Olivia is sleeping on her own in a trundle bed beside ours. All is good.  THANK YOU BEACHES! Tomorrow is going to be another special day – I wonder what wonderful surprises it will bring.

Day 3 - Another day at the Beach

Today started slowly.  We changed and got ready for breakfast.  A bug surprise happened though.  We took out the stroller from the closet and on our way out Olivia hopped in. Within seconds she started screaming!!!!  She leaped out of the stroller and she was covered in ants.  We quickly grabbed her and started slapping off the ants that were on her arms and legs. It was horrible!  Then we saw the little bites. Ugh. Poor thing.  We checked out the stroller and there were tons of them!!!!  Martin quickly took a towel and started cleaning the stroller.  Olivia was crying. Ugh…not a good start to the morning.  So, after we calmed her down.  We walked over to reception and explained that we had an ant problem in our room.  In fact, everything in the closet – our laundry, our luggage and stroller was infested.  The manager was extremely apologetic and it made sure it was dealt with right way. As for our infested clothes, he told us to put it all in a bag and they would take care of it that day.  We were very grateful. 

You know it’s the Caribeean, there are insects and lizards. We knew this going in. We didn’t make a big fuss about it.  They came in and RAIDED the place. So, it was dealt with.  After that, we went for breakfast and then headed to camp. We second guessed about sending the kids to camp today.  But, by the second day at camp the counsellors were excited to see them and Olivia actually said that she wanted to go. YAY! We said our goodbyes and left for the beach.

 Actually, before the beach we made a detour to the Gift Shop. We felt guilty that we were missing all the Sesame moments at camp so we bought a camera so the staff could take pictures of the kids.  The staff there are so awesome. After that, we felt good about leaving them knowing that their fun moments would be captured.

Off we went to the beach.  We laid down, swam, rested, swam, and rested.  It was so restful.  We went back to our Arizonas (our fajitas) place and had a wonderful lunch.  During this time, it was still overcast, then a bit of raindrops but not too much, then a small break of sunshine, but then back to cloudy.  In all that, we both ended up with a sunburn. Sigh. You can’t judge the UV when it’s cloudy. I guess that’s what you get for staying in the water all day in the Caribeean.

After lunch, we rested and swam more.  Then it was time to pick up the kids. We walked in as Olivia was doing a duck hunt with Ernie. It was sooo cute. They were outside screaming as all the kids were running around grabbing rubber duckies. We didn’t want to interrupt with her fun. Ahhahaha. We just watched her from the window. She was so excited. Then I went out and waited for her as they counted how many ducks they got.  As soon as she saw me, we was eager to introduce me to Ernie and show me the ducks. Hahahhahah

After the little hunt, we got them ready to go to the beach again. It seemed like the perfect time because it wasn’t as hot and the beach was somewhat quieter. Olivia was in her element. She kept running and splashing in the water. William not so much. He preferred sitting and playing with the sand. But when he saw how much fun Olivia was having, he RELUCTANTLY and SLOWLY approached the water.  It was hilarious.  Whining, he went to the waters but wanted to be carried. As much as we tried to entertain him in the water, he was not having it.

Papa finally took him out deeper and he was clinging onto to dear life. At least he wasn’t whining.  The sand beneath his feet was something new and he wasn’t quite sure how to react to it. It didn’t help that the waves were a bit stonger and tide was pulling him into the water too. Hahahaha. Oh well. We have 3 more days to get him “beach happy”.

It was almost 6pm when we left the beach. It was getting colder and we were hungry.  Olivia didn’t want to leave, but William’s trantums told us it was best to get back.  We headed back to the hotel room and took a bath and headed out for dinner. We had a great dinner at  Guisepppe’s – the restaurant next door. We usually go  there for breakfast. We were going to try something different but the kids were done, and actually so were we.  It was a good choice because the selection was amazing.  Finally a yummy pasta dinner.  During dinner too, there was a dance party on the stage across from us for the kids. Olivia was able to watch the kids dancing away and then came BERT from Sesame Street.

Good lord, she nearly jumped out of her seat. She was screaming “LOOK! LOOK!  BERT!”.  We knew that dinner was over. Ahhahaha. Martin took Sir William back to the room (for obvious reasons) and I took Miss O to the stage.  She literally walked onto the stage danced with Bert. It was over so quickly and we had to say good bye to Bert.  She walked back down the stage and sat on my lap. She was done. We watched for another 10 minutes as the MC was introducing ALL the kids that were on the stage. Good lord.  So we left.  She feel asleep instantly when Papa put her down (lucky guy!).  And that was that.  Tomorrow is going to be a FULL day for everyone!

Camp Sesame – Day 2

We the kids did not disappoint. They woke up at 7am. Ready to go. Good lord, didn’t we tell them vacations mean sleeping in?  Sigh. We got up and got ready to head out for breakfast.  Sign in at Camp Sesame started at 9am.  :0P

We were still unsure how we were going to handle this.  After the day we had yesterday, we needed a break and the kids needed some cool activities. During breakfast we worked out a plan. Maybe half day, maybe just a couple of hours.  We were not worried about William so much as he could be easily distracted. Olivia on the other hand, has a history of separation anxiety. It would be interesting.

After breakfast, we headed to Camp Sesame and totally played it up. The childcare workers were lovely and the quickly took to these monkeys. Olivia and William just wanted to play.  We fillout the necessary forms and Martin took Olivia to get settled in ther program and I took William to get settled.  We said our goodbyes and left.  Of course, it took us awhile because Papa had to go through his list of questions and concerns about the kids. The people there patiently listened and told us not to worry they were going ot have a great time.  Worked for me!  They gave us the cell phone and off we headed to the beach.

We found our lounges and settled in to enjoy our morning at the beach – constantly checking our phone to see if they had called.  I actually got to read for an hour and half!!!!  Martin went swimming in the ocean.  It was heavenly.  Then, it was time to make that decision. Do we pick up O from camp?  Nope.  No phone call, means no worries. So we let that go and they had lunch with the other kids.  Maman and Papa had lunch by the beach.  Some yummy jerk chicken and pork fajitas.   I even took a virgin strawberry daiquiri just because we were on vacation. Oh man, we are eating wayyyy too much. This inclusive vacationing is dangerous.

After lunch we had to head back to the room. Papa had a conference call to make, so I headed to the pool to read some more. It was so peaceful.  When papa returned, we had an afternoon snack and rested by the pool. By 3:30, we were missing the kids. Hahahha Maybe too feeling kind of guilty that we were enjoying ourselves too much without the kids. :0P  We headed back to the camp.

When we got there, the child care workers told us they had a wonderful day!  What?  Yup, the kids were great!  They played well, ate well, and were still sleeping?  What?  Olivia took a nap?  GREAT!!!!!   As we were talking though, Olivia was started to get out of her sleep when she saw us at the door. Still disoriented, she ran over and hugged us!  Yay, she wasn’t crying!  WE signed her out, but left William because he was still sleeping.  We decided to take Miss O to the beach.

That was the time of the day for us.  She loved every minute that she was at the beach. Papa and Olivia ran and swam, we built sandcastles.  She was all screaming with glee and laughing. This is a true family vacation.  She is such a beach bum.  It was 4:30 and it was time to pick up Sir William.  She didn’t want to go, but we promised we would take her back the next day.

We got William who was just as happy to see us when we got there.  Sure, enough though he did a tantrum as were walking out because he wanted to be carried. Poor guy.  So Papa lifted him up and he was happy again. Ugh this boy!  We headed to the pool where the kids could burn more energy before dinner.  After the pool, we went back to our room and got ready for the BEACH PARTY!

The Beach party turned out to be a fabulous event!  WE got there early so the kids were able to walk around, jump in the bouncy castle and play.  There were rows and rows of fancy picnic tables and we quicky found one near the front.  We got ourselves settled and then the show began!  It turned out to be “Big Bird’s Beach Party”.  All the characters showed up and did a wonderful performance for the kids. Olivia ran up to the front and started dancing and waving at all the characters. She was not so shy this time!  She had a blast. William actually got up there too, clapping and bouncing away.  We all ate well. 

Olivia got so swept away with the party that she actually took off. While Martin went to get his food I watched Olivia dancing up front on the stage.  Suddenly,  all the Sesame characters walked off the stage and went back around the stage.  Then I saw Olivia bolt and run after them.  I literally jumped out of my seat and chased her. I left William alone at the table and ran like 50 feet to catch her.  Crazy child!  She just wanted to say hi to them. What a heart attack she gave me.

Anyways…we had dessert and then it was time to go. William had enough and was in his stroller for the remainder of the night because of his temperament – he was done. Olivia’s cheeks were flushed red – means she was totally exhausted to.   We walked back to our room and the crashed (eventually).  Not bad for day 2.  Definitely Camp Sesame again tomorrow

Are you happy Papa?

Our family vacation started at 4am Thursday morning. We both slept close to midnight doing last minute things and were completed exhausted.  Not a good start…starting at 0 energy for our vacation. But doesn’t that always happen?

We woke up the kids, and they were great despite the darkness. Olivia was amazed that is was still so dark. William, well, we literally got him up 5 minutes before we left. We got the airport in no time, thanks to Papa’s anxiousness.  We checked in and went through customs with no difficulty. We were able to run around and eat a “proper” (Tim’s croissant and muffins) breakfast before we boarded. Our flight to Charlottle took off at 7:30 and about 8:00am everyone had passed out for the flight. We manage a good flight with no tantrums, minimal crying, and no iPad. It was great!

We got to Charlotte happy and somewhat rested, but starving again. The airport was lovely, and it had a Starbucks every 50 feet.  Unfortunately, our stop over wasn’t long enough to enjoy this treat. We had lunch , then family bathroom time, and then we boarded our 3 hours flight to TURKS AND CAICOS.

We manage another nap. A longer one for Miss O thankfully, but William just couldn’t get comfy.  Needless to say, we gave lots of snacks, some walking time up and down the aisle, and some iPad time.  Finally we landed, with screaming toddler and wanted to jump out of the plane.  It was an interesting landing, the waters surrounding the island were beautiful.  When we got out of our plane, we were surprised that we had to walk down the plane and onto the tarmac.  Olivia was amazed by how big the plane was. Martin and I were amazed by the gust of humid Caribeean air that struck our faces.  YAY!!!!!

We got our luggage and found our shuttle. We headed towards our hotel in the brief rain shower. Who cares!  We were at Turks and Caicos!  We arrived to our hotel and we were greeted by a man who gaves us wet towels to refresh ourselves. Dozens of greetings and welcomes, and yummy fruit RUM punch.  At this point, Olivia and William were over excited and want to run!  Run they did - in the front lobby and devoured all the snacks available to them, while we were checking in. Oh forgot to mention, the lovely yummy punch spilled all over beautiful Parisian style chairs. What a day!!!! We needed to get to our rooms and out in the fresh air.

We got to our lovely room.  A large king size bed, then a trundle bed for Olivia and in the corner we fit a crib for William.   It was tight, but we had the best location and a first floor walk out.  It was perfect. When we got there, we managed to change into lighter clothing and unpack. But the kids were getting ancy and needed to move.  We loaded up the stroller again and went to explore our grounds.  Maman and Papa headed first to Café Paris for a well deserved latte.  We were dying!  It was sooo good that as we were walking and drank it so fast that I spilled some on my white shirt. Ugh.  Anyways…we got our caffeine (even though mine was decaf) and ventured out.  We saw the pools, we saw Camp Sesame, and then we got to the beach. Halleluja!  We were in heaven.

Olivia right away wanted to go down and play in the water.  So we took off our sandals and dipped our feet in the ocean. Yay!  Actually everyone except Sir William.  As soon as his toe touched the water, he turned back and headed straight to the BEACH LOUNGER!  It was hilarious! Here we are splashing around in the water, and William managed to climb up on the lounger and just sat there watching.  Sure enough, all this playing around someone was going to get really wet. The tide was pretty strong that time of night, and pulled Miss O back. She lost her balanced and in she went into the water. Face and all. Sigh.  Now what.  We didn't bring anything with us to the beach.  So Papa had to take off his shirt and give it to Olivia because our room was about a 5 minute walk from the beach, and she would have been frozen.  So we took off her wet clothes and slipped on the shirt.  She actually thought this was hilarious. People were laughing too!  It was a priceless moment. This will be interesting!

We left the beach and walk around the Italian village and picked up a couple of pizzas and headed towards our village – the French quarters. Man, we love this all-inclusive stuff.  We hadn’t done "all inclusive" ever, so this picking up food and leaving was new to us. We got to our village and had our dinner.  We were done.  But…the night was not over.

After dinner, we went back to the room to give the kids a quick bath. Then we headed back out to the main stage which was around the corner from our room to watch The Sesame Street Concert. We got there, Olivia started off excited, but then out of no where, she panicked and want to go.  I think it was a mixture of over tiredness and the new place.  We calmed her down and show started.  As soon as the characters stepped on that stage she had forgotten why she was so nervous. She was waving and screaming as all the characters came on stage to sing. She and William were clapping their hands and she just wanted to dance. It was so much fun to see. We had built this trip up so much with Olivia and William about Elmo and the other characters. We were relieved to see that Olivia was excited about that too.  Tomorrow would be less difficult when we leave them at camp.

After the concert, they were done and so were we.  We were up since 4am!  We got back to our room and slowly the kids passed out. As soon as the kids passed out, Papa went out to get ourselves some sweet treats.  Then finally we both passed out.  What a day, but we made it.  And it’s heaven here. Till tomorrow.

WIlliam's Milestones - at 15 months old

Ever since he came home, he amazes us everyday with all the new things he has picked up.  I guess it helps the he's a big copy cat.  He's starting to say "Hi!" when we go out.  Manners always - "S'il vous plait/Please and thank you!".  He can tell you how old he is by pointing his index finger.  When he sees Elmo on TV or in a book (yes, it's brainwashing), he starts singing the ELMO song.  He's knows "Pablo" from the Backyardigans (one of Olivia's favourite shows).  The list can go on and on. It's amazing how much he has grown in only 4 months. 

Below is clip of him trying to put on his shoes so he can go out. This the last minute of the whole process. He persevered for about 5 minutes before asking help.