Day 4 - EXHAUSTED!!

Ok I never thought I would be this tired on vacation. There is so much to do and now we are in port – St Maarten!

We woke up this morning to no rocking! Oh yeah – we were suppose to arrive in St. Maarten. Yeah! I look out our deck and for the first time in 3 days I see land. The kids still sleeping and our excursion not until 1130am – we had plenty of time. We all got up around 830 and headed to breakfast. We than changed and headed to the pool with the kids. It was great – we got some lounge chairs right in front and the kids were happy using the side and playing in Mickey’s Pool. We grabbed some lunch there and then headed to our meeting place for our excursion. We were doing the “Afternoon Beach Bash”.

We were taken to a beach on the French Side of the island. We drove straight into gray clouds. As we got off the bus it was raining. Well, at least it was warm outside.  We found a couple lounge chairs with an umbrella and maddie went straight for the water and zach for the sand – krissy went for a lounge chair and laid out…..in the rain – good thing she likes it! Dan is not feeling all that well – nothing I should discuss here. So he sat by zach for a bit and than in the lounge. I hung out in the waist deep warm sea water with maddie. I met a really nice Lady named Kerry. She and her son and daughter were playing with Maddie in the water. Her husband has MS and is in a wheelchair. He sat up in the sand waiting for when his son wanted to play in the sand. Wow – how humbling! It was 2 great hours fighting the current and making sure Maddie didn’t get swept away.

We got back on board and are exhausted – but wait – it’s Pirate Night!! So we all get our costumes on – inlcluding Zach and head to dinner. They had cute bandana’s for us at the table. Dan looked the part – thanks to some friends that loaned us their pirate gear. From there we headed up for the Pirates of the Caribbean deck party. Now this didn’t start until 930pm. Zach doesn’t like the loud music etc and Maddie had a headache. There is a lot of bickering going on too. So to our room we went. I did stay to get some pictures. We were all asleep in bed by 1030pm. EXHAUSTED!

Pictures

I am not able to post pictures because the satellite is too slow and errors out every single time. I will post as soon as I can - we could have free internet in the morning once we are in port.  I will see - that what we heard. 

Day 2 - Sun + Fun!! Happy Valentines Day!

First of all – we (ok - me – Jan) didn’t even wake up until 820am. Then of course I had to wake Dan to tell him how late it was. Poor guy! Zach was up shortly after, but Maddie was not up until 930a and krissy until after 1130am – she didn’t get in until 2am though…..teens! Guess she hasn’t had a problem making friends! The sun is out the sailing is much smoother and it looks like it will be a great day.

So I headed off to get a good breakfast and to the scrapbooking session. I then met back up with Dan and the kids to have brunch with them and to hold our spot in line to see 4 of the princesses (Tiana, Aurora, snow white and Belle). We ended up close to the front and got Krissy down to get in the pictures with them. Zach is tired of seeing all the “girly” characters so he and Dan headed back to the room. As the girls and I finish with the princesses we see Alice and the Queen of hearts. We headed upstairs to them and ended up also getting pics with Peter Pan. The queen and Alice we hilarious, the queen purposely dropped the pen cap, was upset that Maddie’s shirt said “If you think I am cute you should see my grammy” and not “the queen of hearts”. She ruffled Krissy’s hair too.

After all that excitement we all changed and headed to the pool……and to our surprise so did the other 500 passengers….wow was it a bit crazy. None of us had any sun until today so of course everyone went to the pool. We stayed there for about an hour and head back to get ready for the show. We thought it would be good to try the early showing (2pm) and that would open up our evening. We saw Twice Charmed – a twisted tail of Cinderella. Loved it! So did the kids. Krissy and maddie sat on the edge of their seats.

After the show we changed for Tea with Alice. We got to learn how to properly have Tea from Alice in Wonderland. There was maybe only 50 people total. So it made it intimate. We also got pictures and autographs. We got to enjoy apple juice and chocolate chip cookies. So much fun!

From there we changed (yes again) for dinner. Finally able to enjoy the whole dinner. None of us sick from the rocking, nowhere to rush off to. We got to know the family sharing our table with us and Cornwall and Bojan (our table host) showed us some tricks with our wine bottles and gave us some tips for our port in St Maarten tomorrow. We even brought some dessert back to the room.

The kids came back and got into their pajamas for Plutos pajama party at the Oceaneers club. Krissy went to hang out with the teens and Dan and I got to enjoy some Adult comedy in the Rockin’ D Bar.

When we wake up tomorrow we will be in St Maarten. We are doing the afternoon Beach Bash tour. 3 hours. But who know if we will decide to explore more on our own.

I was thrilled to have the sun today. We will see what tomorrow brings – its 1203am now. Phew! I am beat!

Day 2- gray rocky day at sea

Well, the kids and I are learning what it is like to have sea legs. This boat is rocking ALOT!  Even the crew is telling us this is worse than normal.  Dan is right at home. :)  Today was busy but relaxing.  The kids and Dan had a Character breakfast at 8am - I had a manicure.  But I was able to meet up with them late.  The wait staff made silly hats for everyone out of napkins, cups and silver plate covers.  It was hilarious to walk in on.  Than the kids went up to the "lab"...we did not see them until 3pm!! They made flubber, cooked cookies with ratatouille and had lunch with new friends.  We would check in on them and they didnt want to leave.  Kristina and I went and played bingo - Dan went and took a nap than Kristina headed up to the "vibe" to play cards with other teens - so Dan and I went and had a coffee on deck (they provided blanket for those of us crazy enough to sit out there) together.  We went and worked out together and came back got ready and had lunch - just the 2 of us.  So nice.  Wondered around some shops and made our way to "shutters" to check out our pictures the ship staff had taken. Than back to get the kids and rest in our room. Tonight was formal night and we all looked the part.  Zach cried as he got dressed but he got it together long enough for us to make it to dinner on time.  I am feeling a bit "out of it" I am not sure if its all this swaying or if its being overly tired? Not that I feel sick - not sure - so I had a lite dinner and skipped desert.  But no worries - there's a ice cream machine on the upper deck that you can help yourself too.  Dan had a massage after dinner- no not by me - at the spa!  He says its been a long time since he had a massage like that.  He is a noodle.  He met me and the kids at the Show - "Villians Tonight".  All about the disney villians.  It was spectular.  After it was over we headed back to the room and changed for the pool.  The kids enjoyed that pool as is sloshed from one end to the other.  It didnt even phase them.  We came back here and changed - its now midnight and sleeping in tomorrow is a must.  Should be easy to do since we have no scheduled breakfast to be at.  Oh - but there is scrapbooking!! Yes you heard me correct! I am excited - not sure Dan is.  Good night!!

Day 1 - let the Magic begin!

We were up earlier than I thought.  We had to have our bads ready for pick up.  We headed down to the atruim of the hotel and into the shoping area of the airport to get some "breakfast".  For the first time ever my kids refused McDonalds!  Huh - who would ahve thought?  I personally think its because they werent getting a "toy" with breakfast. However I talked them into some pancakes with sausage and thank goodness for Starbucks.  The famiyl was happy.  We were able to sit still for a little bit before heading to the "Disney Magical Express".
We made our way the the check in counter and onto and bus with windows just like large port holes.  IT would be a 50 minute ride to the port.  They kept us entertained with trivia questions, short cartoons and a short movie of the boat we would be cruising on. 
We made it to the port and once up stairs we saw Mickey first thing!! And Pluto came out next.  We had to wait for our boarding group which thankfully was #6.  We walked up the gang way (which was a large yellow mickey head) They took our picture and than annouced to the entire ship "Welcome Haase Family".  Ok - I cried - I was so over whelmed that we were there and really going on this cruise. 
Although our room was not ready for another 2 hours we headed up stairs by a pool and had pizza.  Maddie ate 4 pieces - Zach -1.  Dan and I enjoyed a bahama mama!! Now - thats a great start to a vacation!  We headed to the oceaneers Lab and Club and got the kids checked in and got their bracelets on.
We roamed around the boat some more and got into our room around 130. Our luggage would not come til around 5pm.  So we decorated our room and headed up for a late lunch at Top siders beach blanket buffet.  Even the water cups had mickey heads on them. 
We had our emergency drill at 4pm and than headed straight to goofy's pool stage for the "kick off party".  Now this was fun.  We danced with the kids, they us all streemers to shake around. And they brought out all the characters!  We staryed and danced a bit more (although Zach was in Dans arms almost the entire time) and Maddie got right up there and danced with Daisy Duck!  We had tocome back down to the room and get ready for dinner at 545.
Tonight we ate at Animators Palate. We have a nice family from Canada dinning with us.  This dinning room is made to start out as black and white and turn into a colorful palate with lots of Disney pictures on the walls coming to life.  After Dinner we checked the kids in at the oceaneers kids club and Dan, Krissy and I did some shopping.  But we only had 45 minutes before we checked them out of the club and headed to the show.
the show was about a young boy who was going on a disney cruise and wanted to be a captain some day.  They also had a couple of the comedians there to give you a sample of their show that you could go see later in the week. 
We had 2 very tired kids and so we headed back to our room and ordered milk and cookies for all!  After all - it was 1045p!! And we have our character breakfast at 8am tomorrow!! What a fanatastic day!

Arrived in Orlando!

We have arrived here in Orlando.  So excited.  We did have a rough start with Zach "feeling sick to his stomach" most of the day.  We traveled with zip lock bags at his side.  However we got on our flight from Den to Orlando and he was perky and even napped for a almost a hour.  Phew!  So we have had dinner and are all tucked in our room here at the Hyatt and bathed and ready to start the fun tomorrow!  We will catch the shuttle around 1030am headed for Cape Canaveral.  Here are some fun pictures taken so far today.  Cant wait to see what is in store for us tomorrow! 

back at it again!! There must be something on the horizon?

So here I am agian!  another almost 2 years later - posting! I even struggled to be able to sign in! I am hoping to be able to keep up with this a little better.  I also want to record our newest adventure - A Disney Cruise-7 day eastern carribean!! We leave this coming Friday and are so excited.  I will be re-sending this link to our families so that they can see what we are up to if they want.  This will be a vacation of a lifetime! I am rushing around to get this prepared. I made the kids autograph books, journals and all the decorations for our door to our room. hopefully I wont be so tired that I sleep through our vacation - ha!  Ok - now that I got back on and I can post here again - I will keep it all updated.  Good night - for now! xoxo