Antarctica- Cruisin'!

Okay, we are now officially on our way to ANTARCTICA! Getting on the boat, I mean ship, I was still wondering how we were going to do this cruising thing. If you know us, and hopefully you do know us, since you are reading our blog, you'd know that we are just NOT what we thought typical cruisers are. Well, it didn't matter that at least 50% of the people were over 65 or that they were doing what they were doing. We didn't have to be hardcore "cruizies," as we called them (The cruizies were always mentioning all of the other cruises they had been on before and asking about our previous cruises...oh, and they wore lanyards around thier necks with their gold, elite or platinum cards prominently displayed. Mike and I shared a number of laughs about this.) . We could do our own thing and we really had a great time!

One thing that really worked for our benefit was that there were 15 kids under the age of 13 on the ship. So, between the Rollins' and our family, we had 1/3 of those kids! On trips that carried more children, there are 2 classrooms for the young children. One for ages 3 to 8, another for the 9 through 12 year olds. Because there were so few children, staff only worked in one room, combining the children. That left an empty room for us to play in on cruising days! Paige loved to go with the other children (and made some friends, of course!), but the rest of us would usually go into the other room together. We weren't allowed to leave (and wouldn't want to leave them anyway!) our under three year olds, so we had to be there for Jack, Bran and Nuala. Usually, especially in Antarctica, We would take turns watching the children and going out on the deck. It was really nice. The kids got to play with play dough, color, climb and slide and just play with toys and we also got to enjoy the company of Fiona and Zac.

Jack LOVED Nuala and Fiona. He would often sit on Fiona's lap or ask her to pick him up. I don't have a picture of her carrying both Jack and Nuala. It was cute. Although it was not always cute to Nuala, who sometimes wanted her mama to herself. "No Jack. Noona Mama!"
I cannot remember what Jonah was being that particular morning. Maybe a turtle? He is in the bag of toys that was in "our" playroom. They sanitize the toys in that bag. Paige is watching a movie in her classroom and Jack sat up next to her. He sat for less than half a minute, but I love the way he is sitting up so straight. Oh, and the girl in the glasses is the "mean girl." She did not like Jack or Nuala or Bran. Apparently they were too sweet for her taste. We were glad to have our own playroom!

In the afternoons, usually Mike, but sometimes I would take Paige and Jonah to the pool while Jack napped. Again, since there weren't many children, the pools were not full. There were a number of pools on the ship, but we preferred the one that was sheltered, with glass surrounding it. We could still see outside and it was usually pretty comfortable temperature-wise in there. Paige was a fish! Jonah enjoyed the hot tub because he could reach the bottom, but also because it was a good place for him to find random people to socialize with and he really loved to crawl around the ledge a lot...
Another thing that worked for us on the cruise was the food! We really enjoyed eating and who doesn't enjoy 2 or 3 fancy desserts every day?! I loved not having to cook and Mike enjoyed shrimp cocktail as his appetizer almost every night! Because buffets are so hard with children, we would go to it sometimes for breakfast and we did go to it one time at lunch, but usually we went to the regular dining room. It was very nice and we were served in courses, so it usually took 90 minutes to eat. I was AMAZED with our children. I knew that Paige could sit for that long, coloring on her place mat and talking, but Jonah and Jack? Wow! They sat in their seats and we had compliments often on how well behaved our children are. They just didn't see or hear them for long enough apparently... We were so thankful though, because we really got to enjoy the service and the food and each other.

Here are some pictures from our "fancy night" dinner. We dressed so that we would "pass" for formal. The boys wore shirts with collars but no ties. Mike did the same. I have to say that I do not like ties on him anyway. He always looks like he's choking. Paige wore a pretty dress from Aunt Barb with her little black cardigan over top. I wore the same black dress I always do. I bought that dress years before Mike and I were married and we'll be married for 9 years on Wednesday! Oh, and Nana wore a green dress with glitter. Paige loved it and really wished that I had a dress with glitter on it as well. She also had concern, after seeing Nana in her glitter dress, that she might not be dressed up appropriately. Oh my goodness. How old is she? (Paige, not Nana)

Oh, Paigey, we need to work on your table manners! She has never seen a need to use a fork for her broccoli... We ordered Lobster tail and monk fish for Jonah. He ate his entire tail AND the monk fish AND his chocolate ice cream. He came up to me after dinner, wanting me to smell him. He wanted me to smell chocolate on him, but I could only smell butter. He sure loved dipping his lobster and monk fish! The boy was in heaven!

Jack's favorite meal on the ship was grilled chicken breast and steamed broccoli or corn, followed by sorbet.

Here is Jack, eating basil-lime sorbet. It was REALLY pungent, but he loved it, just like he loved the lemon sorbet. He preferred the stronger tasting sorbets to the sweeter ones, like cherry or blueberry. He only at a couple bites of those. He finished this sorbet.

And here we are having one of our nightly desserts!I don't know how other people put their little ones to bed... We seemed to be the only ones sitting in the hall, waiting for Jonah and Jack to be silent and asleep (Paige usually slept in Nana's room.). Jack just cannot settle down with us (especially me) in the room. But we made the most of it! Mike would always go down to the International Cafe' and pick out dessert for the two of us.

More to come soon! We are having technical issues getting our pictures from my mom from Montevideo, Uraguay, our first stop on the cruise (where Zachariah, Fiona, Bran and Nuala live and came aboard the ship). I got some from her today, just not all of them. We'll have them soon enough!