Is This Really Happening???

It didn't really hit me that we were going to Cancun for a month until we were waiting at the counter to get our boarding passes.  Which is sad really.  We've been looking forward to this trip since last August when I booked the condo but we had a completely crazy, stressful, and chaotic school year to get through.  At times I didn't know if we would actually be able to go for various reasons.  The past two weeks since school got out turned out to be an avalanche of awfulness.

For the record we have had:
1 case of Strep (Rose), Nathan had a set of partial seizures, 3 cases of Tonsillitis (Darin, Ginger, Nathan), 1 bout of allergies that turned into a Sinus Infection and Ear Infection (Me), 4 dentist appointments, 3 Orthodontist Appointments, 2 trips to the lab to draw blood (Nathan), about 8 trips to the doctor with corresponding trips to the pharmacy, an abscessed tooth and emergency root canal (Ken), Ken had a week long business trip and the week he was home he got pneumonia, Cub Scout Day Camp Volunteers (Darin and Nathan), Darin went to Scout Camp, 2 major parties, our Suburban broke down (while Ken was out of town, of course!) and need an new alternator and battery...oh, and me and the girls got LICE!

That last week when Ken and Darin were gone went by in a daze.  I was walking around like a shell.  If it weren't for my good friend Jeannie coming over to give me a lice treatment at midnight one of the nights I really don't know if I would have ever made it out of bed the rest of the week.

The night before we left consisted of running around to do a few last minute errands and getting haircuts, picking up Ken from the airport (he was returning from a business trip in DC), driving up to Lost Pines to pick up Darin from Scout Camp, only to get home around 11:30pm.  We still had to unpack Ken and Darin, wash their clothes, finishing packing us, and cleaning up the house all by 7:30am.  Ken and I forced ourselves to get 2 hours of sleep.  If it wasn't for my Dad coming early to pick us up and help us finish cleaning we would have been late.  I really hope some people come look at our house while we are gone, otherwise I'll be mad we spent so much time getting everything all ready.

Anyway, it felt like we were on this freight train that just kept chugging full steam ahead whether we were ready or not.  I'm thankful we had made the arrangements far, far in advance otherwise I don't think we would have gone on vacation.  I also am very thankful that we paid for everything way in advance (the last installment was paid in April) or we may not have gone either because the last two weeks of craziness carried with it a price tag of over $2000- Yikes!

But we did get ready, by some miracle!  Here we are waiting to board the plane.

Everyone but Rose and Darin ended up falling asleep on the plane.  Which is saying something since it is basically a two hour flight.  When I woke up Rose and Darin were playing a card game.  I love how easily our children travel together!

They were very cute together!

All the horrible stuff was totally worth it once we caught sight of the view from the balcony of our home for the next month!  We love this place!

Darin was still recovering from Scout Camp and he fell asleep right after we unpacked.

Ken and I took the other kids out for a walk on the beach.  When we arrived in Cancun it was pouring rain.  It had stopped but it was still overcast so we weren't quite ready to dive into the water.  It was comfortable with the sea breeze and the water was still plenty warm even with the storms.

This is Rose by the Turtle hatchery outside the Villas Marlin (where we are staying).  Actually you can see our condo in this picture, it is just above the two palapas on the left side.  The turtles come on the beach at night to lay their eggs in the summer.  After they have finished the security guards go out and dig the eggs up and bury them in the fenced off area to that they are protected.  This is one of the reasons that we love to visit in the Summer.  Rose is also holding her pink plastic turtle.

Out on the beach!  You can see that the restoration that they did of the beaches 2-3 years ago made a huge difference.  There is a long expanse of soft, white sand.

After we came in from our walk on the beach we set the kids up with movies and Ken and I went on our shopping trip to Wal-mart and Sam's Club.  We made up a menu for the next two weeks and wrote down a massive grocery list.  It ended up taking us 5 hours from start to finish.  It took us 30 minutes to ride the bus/walk into Cancun proper and an hour just to pile all of our stuff into the taxi and ride it back to the condo and unload it there.  The taxi ride only take about 15 minutes though.  Part of it was because they were having problems running our credit cards.  Ken had to pay in $75 installments which was frustrating because it (of course) declined every other swipe only for it to go through the second time.  Anyway, we are well stocked now!  I'm thankful to have a husband that understands my need to surround us with food:-)  I just don't feel settled until we do and given that the weather wasn't great we decided to get it out of the way.

Our first dinner in Cancun at 11 pm--mind you.  Taquitos with lettuce, fresh guacamole, and crema!  So good!