The Long-Awaited Vacation!!

After a crazy-busy week and a very short night (I slept less than 4 hours), the girls and I left the house at 6am on Saturday (Oct.9, 2010), flew to Minneapolis and then to Ft. Myers, FL. My brother-in-law picked us up around 4pm. Emily passed out almost immediately, while Natalie and I were more or less ok after napping on the plane. Now, if you ever fly to Florida, make sure that you drive directly to the beach - no need to stop anywhere to drop your things off, etc. Right to the beach we went and finally, we truly felt like we were on vacation. Here is Emily (right) and her cousin Katya (left) with Katya's friends, digging a deep hole under Emily's direction.

Here's my sister-in-law Irina with Katerina.

The sunset was glorious but incredibly short. Literally, the sun would plunge into the ocean within about 2 minutes. I videotaped it because I had a hard time believing just how fast it was happening.

On Tuesday, the 12th, my honey along with his mom arrived at my sister-in-law's house. Kids enjoyed some special time with her as she took time to read to them and play with them.

Emily helped Serezha do his Kumon homework. We joked that during our time in Florida Emily practically became a certified Kumon instructor. She really enjoyed helping him - she is definitely a good teacher.

Here are the four cousins: Sergei (almost 5), Emily (7), Natalie (4) and Katerina (7). This really was a special time for them because usually only one of my girls goes to Florida at a time. This was the first time in a while that all four of them were together. And, it was my and Dmitri's first time at my sister-in-law's house since they moved to FL 6 years ago! Hopefully we will go back to visit them again soon.

On Thursday (Oct.14), Alex (Ira's husband) drove us to Tampa where we boarded our ship - Carnival Inspiration. Actually, this photo was taken when we docked in Cozumel, Mexico.

We never tired of the fun towel creations we found in our rooms every night, along with the chocolate (that our kids would steal).

Aah, the cruise food..... Mmmm! It was all incredible. You think there's not much food on this plate? You think we were starving and losing weight?? Oh no! This is just one of the several appetizers we all would get at each dinner, PLUS the main course, PLUS dessert! Honestly, we were never hungry for the next meal. At breakfast we were still stuffed from dinner the night before, at lunch we were still full from breakfast, and coming to dinner we were almost feeling guilty, knowing that we are far from hungry but also knowing that we would definitely eat the upcoming meal.

Speaking of the 'upcoming meal'... At the very first dinner on Thursday night, after the delicious appetizers were served, the waiter (we had two of them) asked if we wanter regular water or Pellegrino (sparkling water). We asked for the latter. Natalie took a sip from her glass, sat it down, said, "I don't like this water." And then she proceeded to... throw up all over the table, including the delicate smoked duck appetizer. We were mortified. The waiters immediately rushed to her, covering everything with napkins. Dmitri wisely suggested that we really needed to have the table cloth changed. The waiters kindly obliged and quickly removed all the plates (that included untarnished appetizers) from the table, the soiled table cloth, wiped the table and then quickly replaced everything. What a good first impression our family made...

So, we're at sea!! And I felt like I was flying! :) Children were having a blast at "Camp Carnival" which allowed my mother-in-law to rest on the 'Serenity Deck' (no one under the age of 21 allowed), and Dmitri and I explored the ship together.

On Saturday we arrived in Cozumel, Mexico!

We rented a car (it cost as much as two cab rides!), and drove to the other side of the island, enjoying the sights during the drive. We first stopped by a pretty beach but due to the rough terrain we chose not to spend too much time there. My mother-in-law though was so anxious to jump into the warm water that she ran for it, despite the sharp petrified corrals.

In the meantime, we stopped by a little vending stand on that beach. Since Natalie had been complaining of the sun being in her eyes everytime we tried to take pictures, Dmitri asked the guy at the stand to make a hat for Natalie. He did so with his incredible fast fingers. Here we are with that guy. He even made little grasshoppers out of the same palm leaves for the girls.

Here's Dmitri modeling Emily's hat and showing off his tattoo (ok, it was a temporary one. The funny thing is that he ended up with a tan-too at the end of the trip - when this one washed off, it left a faint design on his arm that will probably stay there for the next few months!).

We finally found a gorgeous beach, complete with a restaurant. Dmitri loved taking the girls' pictures by this bright green wall of the restaurant.

We spent quite a long time swimming, looking for beautiful shells (found plenty!), and the girls were excited to see the boy from our ship, who happened to get to the same beach with his parents. That boy (Baran) would become almost a part of our family for the remainder of the cruise! He and the girls had a great time together.

After the beach we followed signs and the map that the guy at Alamo rental place scribbled on, and we got to Cedral community that boasted a Mayan temple of love and fertility. Of course, we took lots of pictures there, including of Dmitri, me and my pregnant belly. :)

Oh, the young guy that gave us a little tour also brought out his iguana for this picture. Natalie was very wary of it and didn't want to come near. Emily didn't mind it at all, as though she'd been around iguanas her whole life!

Dmitri couldn't help but stop on the way to take some more pictures of the rocks and the ocean. We were so blessed with perfect weather, considering that the previous two cruises before ours encountered very rough weather due to the hurricane. I see there's one heading that way today!

Our final dinner on the ship. Don't worry, I'm just having an alcohol-free strawberry smoothie! What an amazing vacation we had! I'm so blessed with a wonderful and caring husband who organized the whole thing, and even got us a room with a big window.

That final night I didn't want to leave that window despite Dmitri's requests to go to sleep as we needed to gain strength for the long day ahead of us. However, I just kept staring out of our window in to the darkness outside, just seeing the waves from our ship. It was so beautiful and peaceful. I felt like I wanted to absorb it all. Ok, it IS a big ocean, but still, I didn't want this trip to end so fast. I had never been out in the vast ocean before, and frankly, I was a little nervous of it. But, during this trip I fell in love with the beautiful blue creation all around me - the bright blue of the sky and the indigo blue of the ocean. I will definitely miss the 'Serenity Deck' where Dmitri, his mom and I sat for almost 2 hours on the final night, enjoying the warm breeze on our faces, even though it was almost 10pm.

Thus, our vacation came to an end. The next morning we got off the ship, went to the airport, flew to New York, LaGuardia, then to Cincinnati, getting home at 9pm. That night I still felt like I was in motion whether it was from the ship or the long flights. Probably both.

Thanks for letting me share with you and I pray that you may have an enjoyable and relaxing vacation soon!