Our Caribbean vacation

We escaped the cold weather in Va Beach and headed down south for a wonderful trip! The 4 of us flew to Orlando where my parents were staying in their motorhome. Joseph and Maddy did great on the plane and both took naps! This was Madelyn's 1st time flying and also our 1st time flying as a family of 4. Joseph was VERY excited about going "up, up, up" in the airplane! We arrived to warm, beautiful weather in Orlando and even went swimming in the rv park outdoor pool the afternoon that we arrived! We stayed a night with Nan and Pop in their motorhome.

The next morning we headed to the Orlando airport and Joe and I flew out to San Juan, Puerto Rico where we got on the Carnival cruise ship for our week long cruise to some amazing islands! This was a "I finished nursing Madelyn" trip! I had hoped to nurse her until she was a year old, but she had other plans. She decided the wean herself around 9 months when she started crawling and becoming a very busy little girl. She no longer had patience to sit still long enough to nurse and she insisted on the bottle with the fast flow nipple. Silly girl! I told Joe that I wanted to take a vacation somewhere warm when Maddy stopped nursing, so we picked this cruise and really enjoyed ourselves. Joseph and Madelyn had a fun time staying with Nan and Pop all week in their motorhome. Joseph thinks the motorhome is the coolest thing ever so he gets really excited when he has the opportunity to go stay in it! Joe and I had a fabulous time on our cruise!

Here are Joseph and Maddy eating lunch in the airport before we boarded the plane to Orlando...
Magen's Bay in St. Thomas. This beach is voted one of the top 10 beaches in the world by National Geographic Magazine! It was truly breathtaking and certainly the most beautiful beach I've ever been to........until we went to the Barbados beach several days later! We soaked up the warm sun and swam all afternoon! We enjoyed lunch while we were at this beach and then headed back to do some shopping in the downtown area of St. Thomas were I got some great deals on several sterling silver charms, necklaces, and bracelets! We also rode a skyride here in St. Thomas to what they call Paradise Point which is the highest point on the island that overlooks the beaches. Here is another picture of the beautiful beach in St. Thomas....

A view of St. Thomas on our cab ride back to the cruise ship.

The next day our cruise ship docked in Barbados. One of my good friends took the same cruise we were one 2 years ago and she shared with me the different beaches and excursions that she enjoyed at the various islands. She suggested that we go to "The Boatyard" in Barbados. After seeing her pictures from her trip, I knew I wanted to go to this place! It looked like so much fun and the beach couldn't have been any more perfect! http://www.theboatyard.com The water was crystal clear and the sand was the softest sand I've ever felt and it was also bright white. We enjoyed having lunch in our beach chairs and playing in the water all day. Joe also convinced the guy that was renting the catamarans that he knew how to sail them and wanted to take one out (just the 2 of us). Usually the guy that is rent them sails the boat and you pay him to go for a ride. The guy was a little nervous about allowing Joe to take his boat out, but he said ok and before I knew it Joe and I were sailing all around the Barbados island by ourselves. It was amazing!!! Barbados were my most favorite island that we visited on this trip and St. Thomas came in a close second!

Our next stop.....St. Lucia!

We went zip lining thru the rainforest in St. Lucia and it was such a thrill! It was warm and humid in the rainforest, but that helped make our zip lining experience that much more exciting! There were 12 lines/platforms total and the last one was the longest! It was so much fun to fly thru the air.

The next day we were in St. Martin. We visited Orient Bay which is on the French side of the island. We went to eat lunch at a French cafe and also shopped at the market they have on Saturdays.

Here we are on the ship before we headed to dinner...
St. Kitts was the 5th island we visited. We went to the Marriott resort here and swam in the pool. We then headed to the beach where I got a massage right from my beach chair. It was so relaxing! There were monkeys all around this island and we got to hold some baby monkeys that were wearing diapers. They were super cute, but they stood on top of our heads and that made me a little nervous!

When our cruise was over we got off the ship in San Juan. We stayed an extra night in Puerto Rico before heading back to Orlando. We stayed at a beautiful resort in Rio Grande, Puerto Rico called Gran Melia Golf Resort. This resort had it all!!!! What a fun time!
We missed our babies a ton while we were gone but we got to skype from Joe's phone and receive updates/pictures so that helped! A big thank you to Nan and Pop for taking such great care of our precious little ones while we were away.
On the flight home....
Both kids sleeping again!!! Woohoo!!!
Almost home...