He Told Me So

For four years, my husband has been trying to convince me to go on a cruise. There were two inherent problems with that:

1. I'm not a water person. Perhaps it's because I don't like wearing swimsuits or clothing that is particularly tight/shows my thighs, but I haven't been a water monkey since the tender age of 8.
   
2. I have a paralyzing fear of drowning. I don't want to be in water unless there is land within swimming distance. This is larger-than-life true.

But this Christmas, Ma G and Daddy O rocked the boat and surprised the family with a cruise.

A week without the kiddos. Free vacation. All-you-can-eat food. A week with some of my most favorite people in the world. I couldn't say no.

And now I know why my husband was trying to get me to go. Now I get why my in-laws love it. I am a convert.

I could wax on about the merits and wonderful aspects of the cruise for hours. Far past your reading enjoyment. So I'll tell you of my top moments (this is in no particular order).

I Feel Pretty, Oh So Pretty

I wouldn't be me if the food wasn't the best part of the cruise.

There was this cafe on the promenade level. Twenty-four hours a day, little sandwiches and treats. The best part? You walk up, say you want a Chocolate Avalanche Cookie and the lady doesn't give you a look of chagrin. No, she just smiles and asks how many.

But my favorite part of the food was that we'd get dressed up for dinner every night.

After a day of sweating it up in the humidity and sun, we'd go back to our cabins around 6 p.m., shower and get all duded up and pretty for our massive gorge-fest at 8:30 p.m.

Needless to say, my only souvenir was the 7 extra pounds I packed on during my Caribbean cruise.

My New Beach-Front Property

Obviously I'll have to fight the National Parks department of Mexico for this one, but can you blame me? The Mayans were totally spot on with this one.Although it was humid, that breeze coming off the beautiful beach was totally awesome.

I love history and it was amazing to see these ruins. Tulum rocked. It was small, but packed with ruins. We even got back to Cozumel in enough time to do all the touristy-Cozumel things, like shopping. Totally worth the 120MPH taxi ride we took to the site.

Waterfall Walk

When my husband (who'd been to these cruise stops before) said we'd get wet on the waterfall hike, I assumed he meant when we went under the falls at the bottom.

I never thought he meant that we'd be walking up the waterfall IN the actual waterfall.

Dunns River Waterfall (in Jamaica) was amazing. And I only fell 4 times (not far enough to go all the way down the fall).

And let's be honest: Jamaica was the prettiest stop on our cruise.

Being with Fam-a-lam

I can't get enough of my family.

And obviously they can't get enough of each other.

We capped the trip with camaraderie as Lane and bro-in-law Steve karaoked "Sweet Caroline". Obviously they were the hit of the night.

Insane for Lane

I can't get enough of my husband.

And although we were with family, we had time alone whenever we wanted (not to mention free room service -- seriously go on a cruise).

And now we have a nice romantic photo of us all dressed up for formal night hanging on our wall -- courtesy of the cruise photographers -- where Lane is not posing for GQ.

Scary Towel Animals

Every night, our room steward would do some freaky origami with the towels, utilize a pair of our sunglasses and leave an animal at the foot of our bed.

The first night, I walked into our room unawares. The bedside lamps were on, giving a nice backlighting to the whole situation. And the boat was rocking a bit.

Needless to say, when I walked in on a towel bunny that was lighted from the rear and moving slightly, I totally freaked.

The shows, the shopping, the people, the sun, the FlowRider. Everything. All of it. Too much for words. I loved it.

But you know what really made my trip? Knowing my babies were in better care than I probably give them -- their Grandma (my mother-in-law) took 10 days out of her life and came to watch my babies. With a broken wrist.

Jane was more sad watching Grandma go than seeing her Mom and Dad pack it up for a week.

All considered, I'm already stalking prices for our next cruise.