Monday Minute – The Best Moment Of Our Vacation

As most of you may know, I vacationed with my family in Cancun last week. And as I mentioned in my last vacation post, being with my family in Mexico is WAY different than my annual vacation there with my sisters. WAY, WAY DIFFERENT! But nonetheless, we had fun.

I could go on and on (and believe me, I do!) about how it seems that everyone has their hand out for a tip or about how the Mayan ruins at Chichen Itza, one of the seven wonders of the world, are totally overshadowed by the vendors selling their wares all throughout the site. (Seriously, what started out as a pleasant “No, Gracias” became an extremely stern “NO, NO, NO! LEAVE US ALONE!”)

But I would rather tell you about the moment during our vacation that made all of that worth it. We were going snorkeling at Isla Mujeres one day. But as we were jumping out of the boat, with fins, masks and snorkels already on, my son Adam turned to me with the bottom lip quivering and chin shaking and scared eyes and said “I don’t want to do this, Mommy.”

I don’t know about you, but the quivering lip gets to me MUCH more than crying.

So I debated whether or not to stay in the boat with him, or to make him go. Normally, I give in to these because they are so rare, but I was SO SURE that he would like this, I told him he had to snorkel with the rest of the family. So after a bit more coaxing and help from one of the tour guides, we jumped in and swam to join the rest of the group.

At this point, I told him to hold my hand, and to put his face under water. He did this, and I swam a little bit to show him some things. We stopped, he looked at me with the most incredible face, and he said “THAT WAS AWESOME!!!!” We snorkeled the rest of the time holding hands.

This is why I became a mother. And this is why nothing that went wrong during our vacation matters one little bit.

Karen

Cancun With The Family – Much Different Than With The Sisters!

First, let me start by saying that when I go to Cancun with my sisters, we stay in REALLY nice places, and I have just learned how REALLY nice they are! I am incredibly spoiled. The resort is nice enough, but nowhere close to the resorts we’ve stayed. And the water, though warm, is really rough and choppy. (Surprisingly enough, I haven’t been blamed for this, as DH always seems to blame me for things that go wrong with our vacations. Hey, you don’t give me input in the planning process, you shut up when we get there! Sorry, whole other post!) We’re talking BIG waves, which is lovely to look at , but not so relaxing when you’re in it. Every time I get knocked down by a big wave, I lose my swimsuit bottom! (Thank you, Weight Watchers – and I mean that sincerely!) And you can FORGET peeing in the water. I need more calm for that. So we split our time between the beach and the pool today.

Okay, so let’s back up and talk about the morning we left St. Louis. Well, we just barely made our flight this morning. They actually had to hold the plane for us. Now, I don’t want to name names (DH), but somebody (DH) was having trouble turning off the electricity without turning off the alarm system, which apparently must be done so the house doesn’t burn down. (Did I say DH?) Luckily, I got my own seat a few rows back from the rest of them, so the flight was good! So we get here at about 11:00 and of course our room wasn’t ready yet, so we went to have lunch. Except that lunch isn’t served until 11:30, so we had breakfast (again). At this point, I need to ask the questions…diet, what diet, and what are Weight Watcher points? This is going to be BAD!

Some additional points:

Things I Like:

1. Vacationing with my family.

2. I can have beans at EVERY meal. And Guac!

3. We are staying in a “family room” which means there are 2 rooms connected together. But in the boys’ room, there are kid sized robes and slippers, kid shampoo and an X-Box.

4. Free manicure and pedicure (which I got yesterday) and 2 free 25-minute massages (which I will SO upgrade!)

Things I Don’t Like;

1. Vacationing with my family (Ha ha, just kidding…really).

2. The robes are as thin and rough as a piece of matzo.

3. Gray Food. Really. The other night at dinner, DH’s steak was gray, my chicken was not gray, but was really, really dry, and the boys’ chicken nuggets were SO disgustingly gray, I couldn’t even look at them.

5. Unfortunately, bad food doesn’t equal less food, it only means more fattening food. Sigh, I can’t win.

6. No beach view from the room, but we do have a lovely sunset view!

I think that just about covers it for now! Even though the boys got really burned yesterday (Mommy of the year award to me for not reapplying sunscreen), they are both a beautiful brown today.)

Back to the beach!

Karen