Summer!!

It's been a while since I posted on here.... we've just been having so much FUN this summer that I haven't had time! We've gone from one exciting activity to another! It's been so nice not working this summer (most of the time- I've learned to keep myself busy so I don't go crazy) and having Jeff home for most of it too! The last time I had a truly open summer with no job or school was Summer 2003!! Summer before my Sophomore year. Wow- pretty sad, huh?
So I guess I'll go chronologically since the last time I posted!

Our first boating trip of the season! It was freeeeeeeezing!! But super fun! This was the day after my dinner party I blogged about last time.

Fisher, Eli (cousins) and Alyse on the tube

Me and Alyse on the boat!

Jeff the awesome (and brave!) surfer

My besssst friend! :)

Unle Dirk crashes

4th of July was AWESOME! We spent the whole week up at the cabin in Donnelly, soakin up the sun, boating, hiking, playing cards and building bonfires! Sadly I forgot my camera, so the only pics I have from the whole trip are a couple from boating that my aunt took.

Cousin Megan, Me, Alyse and Jeff on the tube for "Tube Wars"

A mellow part of the ride....... At one point in time my dad flipped the tubes over the right side of the wake and our tube RAN OVER Jeff's tube, and we switched sides with him! I thought Jeff for sure died when that happened, or at least got his head ripped off!

I haven't spent the entire summer just playing... I have done some hobby/skill-developing as well! My mom taught me to use the sewing machine and surger! This was my first project!

An ADORABLE apron I made for my best friend's Bridal Shower! It turned out SOOO cute!!

I was so proud :)

The apron in action!!

One's I've made since then...

This one is my favorite!!! I gave this one to my aunt Rachel for her 

b-day!

I made one more with plum purple, light aqua blue and green fabrics (SUPER cute!) but I can't find it, or the pictures of it.... 

My family went on our ward's Trek this summer, and I braided my sisters' hair for it!

Abby's hair.... corn-row style!

Alyse's hair- all french braided!

The back of Abby's hair- french braided up the back

One of her braids came out of her bun and was sticking STRAIGHT up! Hilarious!

The 3 Hermanas!!

Alyse's finished hair- SO CUTE!!

Morning of Trek- Alyse in her pioneer get-up!

My BFF Maurie's bridal shower in Rexburg!! So much fun!!

Katie (our old roommate), Maurie and Me!

Funny (long) story: That same weekend of the Bridal Shower, Jeff's parents, his bro-and-sis-in-law Mark and Jay and their kids,  bro-sis-in-law Katie and Brady and Jeff all went up to their cabin in Pine while I went to Rexburg. The plan was, that on Saturday after the bridal shower I was going to drive from Rexy to Pine via the scenic highway 26/20- a 3.5 to 4 hour drive. So I left Rexburg at 5 and started my journey to the cabin. Around 9 pm I called Jeff to let him know I was in Shoshone.... thinking I was very close to the turn-off to go up to Pine. But, to both of our dismay, I had taken a wrong turn in Carey, Idaho which was about 1 hr and 15 minutes back. Best word to describe my feelings at that time? Frustration!! To describe Jeff? Nervous- I am notorious for falling asleep while driving! Plus, the night before I had gotten about 2 hours of sleep due to a severe allergy attack in the middle of the night! I was really sleepy. So I drive the 20-30 min to Gooding to get service and Google Maps myself to the cabin. Unfortunately, when I get to Gooding my phone can't get any service! So I can't get ahold of Jeff to tell him where I am, and I can't figure out how to get to the cabin!! I go to the nearest gas station and ask the attendant how to get to Fairfield (which was about 10 min from the Pine turn-off). He doesn't know- "Isn't that the one that's like an hour and a half away, kinda past Shoshone?" he says. "Uh, no. That's Richfield- which I passed on my WRONG way here!" So he calls his buddy and asks him. He doesn't know either. So he calls his mom- whom he can't get ahold of. Calls his dad- "Oh yeah, no big deal just stay going North on this same exact road and it'll take you there!" So- tired, hungry, and frustrated (and about 30-40 minutes after arriving in Gooding....) I drive down that road, and shortly see a sign that says "This way to Fairfield". So I get up to Pine and I'm about 15 minutes from the cabin and a car pulls up behind me and starts flashing their brights at me. So I pull over, and the car pulls over behind me. At this point in time- which is about midnight- I'm so exhausted and frustrated, I think, "Oh, bring it on, buddy! Don't mess with the crazy lady right now!" So I open my door to confront the bright-flashing jerk, and out jumps Jeff out of the passenger seat of Brady's car! He ran over to me and grabbed me into a huge hug. YAY! Mark, Brady and Jeff had set out on a rescue mission to find me- Jeff scared that I had fallen asleep somewhere on the road, and unable to get ahold of me since 9!! He drove my car back to the cabin, and I was welcomed with many hugs of relief that I wasn't dead. I have a great family :)

Moral of the story? Don't take the scenic route :)

So... the very next weekend I get back in the car and drive back to Rexburg for my

cousin Kati's graduation from BYU-I!! Yay! I stayed at a hotel in Idaho Falls with Rachel and her darling baby boy Logan! It was a lot of fun!

Kate and baby Logan! Love this little man!

Kati and her BF Jordan..... We like him. 

We hope he sticks around.

Kati and Mama Jules!!!

Kati and me!!

Me, Kate and Rach!!!

We took a day and went to Roaring Springs waterpark with my mom, sisters, brother, adopted sister Sheeva, and hubby!!

Abby, Sheeva, Alyse, Me

Another funny (shorter) story: Jeff, Alyse, Sheeves, and I all went on a ride together. It's called Thunder Falls family ride, and it's the newest ride in the park. Here's a link to a pic/video of the ride!

So we got on the ride with Jeff and I on the tube facing forward and Alyse and Sheeves facing backward (like the lifeguard told us to ride). This was my 2nd time on the ride, but as soon as we started going, it felt like we were going a lot faster than normal. When we got to the bottom of the ride our tube somehow flipped, with mine and Jeff's side going straight up into the air. We were launched completely off the tube, right over Alyse and Sheeves. It happened so quickly that when we all came up out of the water, we had no idea how it happened- just saw our tube lying face down in the water. The lifeguard came running over and everyone was staring at us, and we had to talk to a supervisor to make sure we were all okay (and that we weren't going to sue the waterpark). I SOOOOO wish we somehow had a video of that..... priceless!

We've done a lot more boating since 4th of July- we're all loving surfing behind the boat! It's quickly becoming our favorite thing to do. And it can be as easy or as hard as you want it to be, so even little guys like my cousin Travis can do it!

Party Time!

I decided to throw a dinner party for Jeff, since his last day of work at his old job was on Friday the 17th. I was really excited to throw my first dinner party, and I planned for about 3 or 4 days before it, all of the yummy food we were going to have! I researched a whole bunch of different recipes online, and also took some from the recipe books I had checked out from the library. I decided to go with a "summer" or possibly "hawaiian"-ish theme. And after about 5 hours of narrowing everything down, I picked the menu, bought all the food, and planned out a rough schedule of the day.
Everything went smoothly! I had my family over, as well as my grandma and her new puppy, Chester. I started cooking at around 1:30 and spent about 4 hours cooking. Here is a pic of the finished product(s):

(In order from L-R)

~Sparkling Raspberry Lemonade

~Fruit salad: pineapple, strawberries, blueberries, bananas, mango

~Awesome plastic margarita glasses from Wal-Mart

~Black bean and red pepper couscous salad

~Chinese noodles, pineapple, olives, green onions, coconut for the Hawaiian Haystacks

~Cocktail sauce and red chili sauce for the shrimp

~Baked coconut shrimp

~Chicken sauce for the Hawaiian Haystacks

~Thai coconut rice (not in the pic)

And here is a picture of the desserts (I forgot to take one before everyone started eating)

(I have to give credit to my 9-yr-old brother Lucas for frosting the cupcakes :)

~Banana Cream Pie

~Mango Margarita Cupcakes (very delicious, very virgin....;)

~Carrot Cake Cupcakes with Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting

This is the adorable pie server my sister Abby got me for my birthday! 

It's a high heel, and the heel is magnetic so you can take it off and throw the server in the dishwasher!!

The food turned out sooooo yummy! I was pretty proud of myself! For those of you who know me, know I am not terribly fond of cooking, so this was kind of a big deal for me :)
The rest of the night we just talked and played with my grandma's new puppy, Chester. He is so much fun and has the biggest, funniest personality! We all love him!

Yes, my grandma is sitting in a camping chair... 

We only have 3 real chairs :)

I was very pleased with how everything turned out. I didn't let my expectations get too high, just in case it all fell apart and we were left eating grilled cheese or PB&J! 

If anyone wants any of the recipes of the delicious cuisine shown above, just email/txt/facebook me and I'll get it to ya! :)

Celebratory blog post (as promised) and MORE

I mentioned in my last post that you'd all be seeing a "celebratory blog post" pretty soon about Jeff's interviews for Edward Jones- and this is the one!!!! Jeff was offered a job as a Financial Advisor for E.J. on Wednesday! We were both very excited when he got the call. We have felt very blessed through this whole process of Jeff hearing about the job, shadowing, finding out he really enjoyed it, applying, interviewing, WAITING, and now finally hearing the good news. And why shouldn't we be excited?? He's going to have a very stable, rewarding career, he will be helping people toward their financial successes, he'll be working for a top-rated company in terms of job satisfaction as well as client satisfaction,  we will, as he builds his clientele, qualify for all-expense paid 5-star vacations to reward him on his excellent work....... Sweet, right??    

.................It gets better.

Jeff got another call on Thursday from Edward Jones. (We're beginning to LOVE calls from them, bringing us good tidings of great joy). This time, it was a guy named Chris, who is a Regional Hiring Manager for E.J., and who Jeff originally contacted to see about starting a career at E.J. He gave Jeff some even better news: he wanted Jeff to take over an entire office, inherit all the clientele for that office, which means the difference between starting out with a strong base of clients rather than starting out with zero clients. AWESOME!!!!

...................Almost.

I've failed to mention one majorly important detail about this job opportunity- can anyone guess what it is? LOCATION. Where in the world could this golden opportunity possibly be? Meridian? Nope. Boise? I wish!!! Utah? Thankfully, no. Sunny California?? If only. Ladies and Gentleman..... Let me introduce you to our new home-

Rupert, Idaho.

Home of the.......... uh........ um............ Wait, what is in Rupert??

So I do a little bit of research: Google- Rupert, Idaho. Search results- travel.yahoo.com/rupert, idaho. "Things to do" in Rupert-click. 

This is the result I got:

Insta-panic! 

"Okay, self. What about shopping?..... Okay there's no button that says 'shopping'." 

Breathe in, breathe out. 

"Okay, self. What about restaurants?..... Okay- Wayside? Guadalajar Mexican Restaurant? Doc's Pizza? Aguila con el Taco? Le's Chopsticks? Burgers Etc? Cargill Animal Nutrition?- Wait, what? Cuisine type: Agricultural Supplies & Equipment???" 

Sheer panic!

Well, this will be an adventure. One of much learning and.... change. But we really are so grateful for the opportunity that we have been given and feel so very blessed to have gotten it. I have to go, but I will write more once the whole idea has settled in a little bit more.

In the merry merry month of May!

Alright, finally updating! May was a very busy month for the Rencher family! We started out the month with my little sister Abby's final Spring Show for the Centennial High School Sweet Liberty dance team. (Following in her older sister's footsteps- tear! :) They performed all of their numbers from this year, plus a few traditional Spring Show "extras". There's the "Dancin' Dudes" dance, where each dancer picks a guy from school to be their Dancing Dude, and the team makes up a dance where all of the dancers and their "dudes" dance together! Always hilarious, always awesome! And then there's the infamous "Parents Dance" (pretty self-explanatory; the parents perform a dance, which is usually bits and pieces of each of the  numbers competed throughout the year. Again, always hilarious and always awesome!) Since my dad missed the first practice for the Parent Dance, one of the other dad's, who is a good family friend and the team captain's dad, decided to make my parents front and center! I don't know that I've ever laughed so hard in my life!


A couple weekends later, we went to........

This was a very long-awaited day, since we've had tickets since LAST May! Jeff's mom Connie, her friend Lana Hill, and my sis-and-bro-in-law Mark and Jaylynn all came down from Twin Falls to see it, and it certainly didn't disappoint! It was TOTALLY WICKED!! :) Jeff was humming songs from it for the next 2 days! ("No one mourns the WICKED!!")

Here's a pic of the stage

Alright moving on.... Jeff had his interviews with Edward Jones Investments over the past couple of weeks, and as part of his final interview he had to go knock doors and get 30 people to complete a short survey that E.J. gave him. This is Jeff on one of the evenings that he went out, and he was practicing his speech for me. He looks so grown up in his suit :)

He's finished all of his interviews, and now we're just waiting to hear back from them! We should be hearing back this week, so I'm sure you'll see a celebratory blog post when he gets the job :)

And now for the BEST part of the month.....

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!!!!!!

Yes, it was my birthday. And out of all 23 of them, this one quite possibly has been the best one yet! After marrying into the Rencher family I was introduced to something called "Birthweek", which means that from the Sunday before your birthday to the following Sunday you get to do as many fun things as you want, have as many parties as you want, get spoiled a lot, and get a lot of birthday love! And boy did I take full advantage of my birthweek this year! I had 7 days filled with all the things I love most!

Sunday, we had dinner with my family and played games. 

Monday, Jeff and I went out to dinner. 

Tuesday, I went birthday shopping, we got Wingers to go and watched the Biggest Loser Finale (GOOOO OLIVIA!!). I also got the news that my best friend, Maurie, and her boyfriend Keith got engaged!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am SO SO SO SOOOOOO excited for them, and can't WAIT to see them on their big day!!!! 

Wednesday, (actual birthday) Jeff and I went to lunch and he brought a giant bouquet of pretty flowers! Then I went and had second lunch with my grandma Bakes, aunt Colleen, aunt Rachel, mom, and my cousin Drew. Then I went to fro-yo with my mom and two sisters. Then I went birthday shopping (again)! Then Jeff took me to a fondue restaurant in Nampa called The Mona Lisa- very romantic and very yummy! Then we went back to my parents house because someone was coming to look at Scarlet (Jeff's motorcycle) and we sold it!! Badabing!! That was a nice little $3000 to put in the bank. Then we went back to our house and I opened my surprise presents from Jeff- a new iCarPlay FM transmitter for my iPod,  a bunch of bath and body works stuff, and a new towel-robe! (I didn't make him wrap all of the things I had bought for myself the past 2 days ;)

Thursday, we went to see the new Kung Fu Panda 2 movie in 3D!! It was awesome!! For any of you thinking about seeing it, I recommend going! Although not quite as amazing as the first one, it definitely had both of us laughing throughout the whole movie!

Friday, I rode with my parents, brother, sister and her friend Victoria down to Twin Falls for my sister Alyse's state soccer tournament. We left in the afternoon and watched her first game that started at 5. A storm blew through right after the game started and lasted until right when the game ended. Crazy wind, torrential rain and COLD!! They tied 0-0. Jeff got off work early and came down at around 6 and we all went out to eat at Jaker's. We all stayed the night at Mark and Jaylynn's house and played air-hockey until pretty late that night. 

Alyse, Lucas and I taking funny pics in the car ride to Twin

Saturday morning, Jeff and I drove to Pine to join the rest of the Rencher family up at the cabin! It was quite a rip-roaring weekend with the whole Rencher clan up there. We got to see Jeff's brother Scott and his wife and daughter Oksana and Uliana who live in Portland!! They made the drive over to spend the long weekend with the family! We all did a lot of fun stuff! We played a lot of games, ate a lot of great food, watched a lot of movies, went on hikes, rode the ATV's, and went to a hot springs on Sunday night! I even got sang to, and Connie made me my favorite dessert:

Yummy fruit trifle!!!!

Pictures from our hike!!

Jeff, Katie, Brady, Jaylynn, MiRon, Oksana, Chad & Remy, Mark

 Me and my oh-so-special husband :)

Mark goes, "Jeff looks like he's singin' a high note." haha

 Jeff, binoculars, and a cave

It was an awesome month, and a preview of the awesome summer months to come!! My birthday ROCKED and I was sufficiently spoiled throughout the whole "Birthweek", thanks to my amazing husband. I am one lucky girl! :)

Easter and other Hilarious Happenings....

Lots of exciting things to blog about!! The week of Easter was a fun one- I had a hair appointment and, up until I got to the appt. and sat down in the chair, I could not decide what I wanted to do! Light or dark? Long or short? Well, here's a picture of what combination was the winner:

It's kind of a terrible picture (the lighting is terrible) but I went with a really dark brown and I took the leap and got bangs! And chopped about 2-3 inches off the length. Again, really hard to see in this pic because of the lighting, but there ya go! 

Next exciting thing that happened- my aunt and uncle (favorites, I might add) Marty and Rachel came up from Utah to spend the weekend with the family for Easter!! They brought their 2 month old baby Logan, so it was really exciting to finally get to meet him! We spent the weekend shopping, hanging out, watching movies,  family dinners, ... the works! 

The Easter bunny visited Jeff and I this year- his basket was chalked full of candy, and mine was full of my favorites: Dentyne gum, Trop50 Orange Juice and Cranberry Orange Muffin Mix and pretty flowers! Good thing the Easter bunny knew not to bring me any yucky candy or sugar.... :)

Easter Sunday we went to the Regional Conference broadcast which was really good. My favorite talk was Elder Uchtdorf (he's usually one of my favorites at Conference, too) and he spoke about the importance of setting spiritual and temporal goals in our families. I love the simplicity of his message- how much more we will accomplish in our families if we just set goals for ourselves! So, we took his challenge and have set our own scripture/prayer/Temple goals. We just started this week, but I'm excited for the added joy, peace and Spirit that it will bring into our little family :)

After Conference we went to my grandparent's house out in Eagle for Easter festivities! It was so awesome to see my cousin Andy and his girlfriend Annie- Jeff hadn't met him yet, so it was nice to see him and catch up on their lives! The kids did Easter egg hunts and we had a huge Easter Feast! A FEaster! :) I have a bunch of pictures of Easter day but I just realized they're on my digital camera, and I don't have the USB cable for it, so pictures will be posted next week when my new one gets here :)

Last exciting/hilarious thing from Easter weekend! Marty and Rachel had originally planned on leaving Sunday night to head back down to Utah, but when it came time to leave, Rachel really wanted to stay longer and spend more time with the family. So the decision was made that Marty would drive my grandma's car back to Utah on Sunday night, and then I would drive with Rach and her 4 kids in their Suburban back to Utah on MOnday and then drive my gma's car back on Tuesday. I was super excited to get to spend more time with Rach and the kids, and help her out with them as they made the long trip back to Draper. 

SO- we left Boise at about 11:30 am on Monday and made a pit stop in Burley so we could eat and let the kids run around. We were there for about an hour and right as we were leaving, my 3 yr old cousin Lizzie announced that she had to go potty- again. So I took her in and she went, we washed her hands, and as she was walking out of the bathroom I noticed she kept pulling at the bum of her jeans and kind of walking funny. So I asked her if she was okay, and she said yeah. I asked her if she had a wedgie, and she said no. So I shrugged it off, and away we went down the road. About 10 miles before Snowville, UT I was driving and Rach was sitting passenger seat, Lizzie yells from the very back seat, "Mama! Mama!" Rachel answers, "Yes, Lizzie?"  "I have poo-poo!" We both whip our heads around to see Liz holding out a crumpled piece of toilet paper with quite a lot of "poo-poo" on it!! Rach instantly goes in to Mommy- mode and finds a paper cup to put the little nugget in- and I go into laugh hysterically- mode. So Rach asks Lizzie, "Where did you get that??" And she exclaims, "From my bum-bum!!" At this point in time the whole incident in the Burley restroom is starting to make sense, and everyone is laughing and trying not to gag- not to mention trying to get Lizzie not to touch anything! Then, to top it all off, we're almost to the Snowville exit and Rachel looks back to see Lizzie sucking on her two fingers that she was just holding her little treasure with a few moments before. She goes, "Lizz! Get your fingers out of your mouth!!!!" And Lizzie goes, "Why mama?"  "Because you have POOP ON THEM!!!" And that's when I lost it completely- I was no-shame, all-out dying of laughter. Well, we got to Snowville and thank goodness she didn't have any "poo-poo" in the car or on her clothes. We figure what happened was that she wiped her bum in Burley, but everything didn't quite make it out of her bum. I told Rach to make sure and write this one down in the good ol' journal and title it, "Things you never think you'll hear yourself (or your kids) say". Boy, I sure can't wait to have kids ;)

6 months = Half a Year!! and Unemployment :)

Yesterday, April 9th marked 6 months of marriage for the Rencher Family!! And all I can say is- WOW! It truly has been the best 6 months of my life! Never a dull moment around here! From moving into our perfect little townhouse, Jeff getting a new job as a system engineer for a telemedicine company, Thanksgiving with the Erickson Fam, the birth of our new nephew Brexon!, Christmas with the Rencher fam and talking to my brother Dallin who is currently serving his mission in the Taiwan, Taipei Mission, weekends at the Rencher cabin in Pine, me getting acute bronchitis, our freakin-amazing honeymoon cruise to the Western Caribbean, discovering that my food allergy to water chestnuts is a lot worse than I thought..., celebrating St. Patty's day with the Erickson fam eating green pasta and green Jello, all the madness of March Madness and participating in my first bracket!, watching General Conference, and the grand finale of me {finally!} quitting my job!!- Let's just say, "Rencher" and "Adventure" rhyme for a reason :)

So back to me quitting my job.... Best. Day. Ever. I had been working for Capital Educators FCU for about 3ish years, and really truly enjoyed my time there. I learned a lot of skills that will benefit me for the rest of my life- mostly financial skills and people skills. I made some of my best friendships there, and was able to gain a lot of people-skills, since I was talking to (or sometimes "dealing with") the members of the credit union all day long. I had the opportunity to apply for and obtain a supervisory position while I was there, and learned a great deal from that experience. Probably the biggest lesson I learned was how to balance my inherent need to "people-please". But when a frustrated or even all-out pissed off person walks into our branch at the credit union, 9 times out of 10 I was the one who got to step in and fix the situation. Tough. Not fun. Irritating. But I developed a tough skin, and learned to brush things off and not take things personally. And I am grateful for those opportunities. But I always just saw this as a temporary means to an end, until I really figured out what I wanted to do with my life. As my friend and boss Jessica put it during my exit interview- "Some people are comfortable being in one position forever, and are perfectly happy doing that. I never really saw you as one of those people. Your creativity and drive and intelligence I knew would lead you to bigger things, once the opportunity was right." Bingo! What better time than now, while Jeff and I are free of kids, mortgage, car payments, etc... to do a little bit of self-discovery! I plan on spending the next few months just exploring what I enjoy and getting my feet wet in as many areas as I can. Exciting? Absolutely!!
And now to tackle a few nagging items that have been pushed to the back-burner the past several months... Getting back in shape and organizing our spare room. I'm more nervous for the latter of the two.... I'm starting tomorrow morning. Can't wait!!
Okay, and I'll also make it a point to blog more. For those of you who get on me constantly about it... You know who you are :)

Honeymoon Cruise~ Caribbean Style!!

Jeff and I returned home from our honeymoon cruise on Feb. 27th! We spent a luxurious 7 days soaking up the sun on a cruise in the Western Caribbean. Our cruise embarked out of New Orleans, LA on Sunday Feb. 20th. The cruise was 7 nights, and included Costa Maya Mexico, Belize, Roatan Island Honduras, and Cozumel, Mexico as the ports of call. 

We flew into New Orleans on Saturday the 19th, at around 8:30 in the evening. I already knew I was going to love our week in paradise when we walked off the plane and felt a wall of humidity! Aaaah, how I LOVE the humidity!! We got checked into our hotel at around 9:15 or so, and walked across the street to the McDonald's for some dinner. 10 pm and 70ish degrees felt AMAZING!! We must have looked like tourists, because when Jeff ordered a McChicken sandwich the lady goes, "Those are spicy here. Just so you know." Haha, that gave us a good laugh. 

The next morning we woke up around 10, and I went downstairs to the fitness center and worked out and Jeff went swimming in the hotel pool. Again, 10 am with 75 degree weather and not a cloud in the sky! We went back and got showered and called a cab to pick us up at 12:30. Our ship left at 5 pm that evening, but check-in on the ship was from 12-3. Our cab driver told us all about the parades that were happening down town, as part of the "pre-Mardi Gras" celebration. We passed the New Orleans SuperDome, home of the Saints, Sugar Bowl, and (some years) the Super Bowl. What little we were able to see of the city during the taxi ride was very.... diverse. We passed some ghetto neighborhoods, then an area of big, gorgeous, Southern-architectural homes, and then the "old" downtown, with old-style churches that looked like they dated back to the beginning of the city, and then the "new" downtown with the big business buildings. We saw a lot of the city that had been re-built after Hurricane Katrina, and we saw areas that still were in shambles from the devastation of it. It seemed like every other billboard we passed was advertising the upcoming Mardi Gras festival. The cab driver told us that almost every street in the downtown N.O. area gets shut down during it. I can only imagine how crazy things get down there when Mardi Gras is going on!!
So we finally got down to the check-in area, which was at the dock where our ship was, behind one of their big downtown conference centers that had been rebuilt after Katrina. We went through what seemed like 5 different check-in stations, and FINALLY boarded the ship!! While we were waiting in one of the lines, I looked out one of the windows at a giant white wall with windows and go, "Whoa babe! Look! There's the ship!!" Jeff started laughing and goes, "Um, actually that's the conference center. The ship is on the other side." And he turned me around- to look out the other side of the building- and then I really saw the ship! Haha the real thing looked a lot cooler than what I thought was the ship. 
The first thing we did when we got onto the ship was go up to the top floor and walk around the deck. 

This was the first picture I took on the ship!

We walked around for a while and then went to check out our (oh so spacious) stateroom! Once our bags had finally been brought down to our room we changed and headed to the food court and had some dinner. The ship finally took off right before the sun set that evening. It was beautiful to see the city from the river!

The ship headed down the river until it finally reached the open ocean at around midnight that night. The next day was our first day at sea. I woke up at around 8 am and was very anxious to see the ocean! We finally got upstairs at around 9:30 and had some breakfast. Then we headed outside to walk around the ship and check everything out. 10 am and around 80 degrees. Heaven!!! We found a couple of chairs at the back of the boat by the kids swimming pool, which was nice and guarded from the strong winds on the top deck. We basically spent the whole day laying out, reading books, eating, playing ping pong, eating, checking out all the different parts of the ship, eating, and eating some more! 

Here's a picture of how windy it was at the very front of the ship! The wind literally would blow you over!

We also found a room that had a wheel that directed those old time ships~ so I took over steering the ship for a while, gave Captain Evans Hoyt a rest for a bit :)

Our first day at sea was a lot of fun. We swam in the pool, ate a lot, walked around, and just soaked up as much of the sun as we could! We met a fun group of two couples that night while we were in the hot tub, and ended up doing stuff with them a couples times throughout the trip!

Alright, so our first stop was in Costa Maya, Mexico. Costa Maya is very flat, with miles and miles of sandy beach. When we entered the "city center" of Costa Maya there was a shopping center, with tons of shops, henna tattoo shops, and hair braiding shops.  

This is a "swim-up" bar right that was right in the center of all the shops! You could swim right up to it and order drinks!
I thought this was a really cool idea... but the more I think about it now, the more I think that mixing drunk people with deep swimming pools might not be the smartest idea....

We took a.... taxi?.... over to a beach about 5 minutes away from the shopping center. It was basically one long paved path with tons of little shops set up all along one side, with the beach on the other side. We found a little restaurant/bar that had free access to their beach huts and chairs, and then they had kids that would come out and take your order for drinks and food. It was so nice!! The ocean was a gorgeous turquoise blue color, perfectly clear, and there weren't any waves because of  a small reef about 100 yards from the beach. 

The... taxi... we took. Okay, really it was a bunch of plastic chairs that were clamped to the floor of a tiki hut that was stuck on the back of a VERY old pickup truck! 

I don't know if you can read the sign above my head, but it says, "You are allowed to tip me. Have a good day!" 

A picture of our ship from the beach where we stayed all day.

There was a pool right on the beach that had dolphins in it, and you could pay to swim with them. They had a rubber ball that they tossed around to each other, and they would jump over the little bridge in the picture. 

The next day we cruised down to Belize City, Belize. Belize is a gorgeous country that is very hill-y and full of lush jungles. Belize is 2 feet below sea level, so there aren't really any beaches. Also, Belize is the only country in Central America where the primary language spoken is English. 
While we were here we did a shore excursion where we went cave-tubing and zip-lining. We took a bus out to a natural park, which was right in the middle of the jungle. We hiked for about 20 minutes to get to the river, and then floated through the caves on big rubber tubes. Our tour guide was awesome! He was very knowledgeable about.... everything really. He told us the history of Belize, the different cultures and nationalities of the people residing there, and he knew every plant, animal, bug, bird,... that we came across. He also knew a lot, and told us a lot, about the ancient Mayans and their culture. 
After we finished our cave tubing, we went zip-lining. There were about 7 different zip-lines, that ranged from 100ft to about 400 ft long. 

We had so much fun in Belize!! We learned so much about the country, and got to experience so much excitement as well. All in all, we would say it was "UnBELIZEable!" :)

Our third port was Roatan Island, Honduras. We didn't have any plans for this port, so we just met up with some friends we had met on the cruise, and rented a van to take us to West Bay Beach, a 20 minute drive from the pier. We found a nice beach and just relaxed, swam, drank pina coladas, and got tan. The water was perfectly clear, no waves, and really warm!

The beach we stayed at in Honduras- very relaxing and warm!

We found a starfish! 

Our last stop was in Cozumel, Mexico. We don't have many pictures from here because it's mostly just a shopping/tourist place. We did visit Jimmy Buffet's Margaritaville Restaurant. It was pretty sweet!

This was, by far, the best vacation I have ever been on! I absolutely LOVE cruising, and am in the process of convincing Jeff that we should skip Christmas this year and do another one- we'll see how that goes :)