Ice Cream and Formals

I was a little concerned about how the kids would make it for meals in the dining room on the ship. It's a four course event that takes about 2 hours. All in all, they really did great! They loved having ice cream almost every meal in the dining room! Preston was insistant on feeding himself. So, I had lots of ice cream stains to treat in the laundry, but who cares!

Two of the nights were formal nights. Preston just happens to have a tuxedo! It is still a little big on him, but I think he was the most handsome guy in the room! Tristan loves to get dressed up, so she wasn't a problem at all! Not to brag...but I think I have a pretty good looking family! Many more pictures to come soon!

Alaska

For those who don't know, this year is my parents' 40th wedding anniversary. For years they have said that they wanted the whole family to go on an Alaskan cruise to celebrate. So now, years (and two kids) later...here we are! Matt and I did an Alaskan cruise for our honeymoon. We loved it! With two little ones in the same room with us it was a different vacation, but wonderful just the same!

I took about two hundred pictures and don't have the ones from my sister and brother yet, so I am going to pace myself on what I upload! Tonight I'll just start with our embarkation day. We flew to Seattle on Friday the 13th. (We don't believe in bad luck!) We got in late and spent the night in a hotel. Preston had missed his nap on Friday, didn't sleep much that night and we were getting on the ship during his naptime on Saturday.

We got on the boat about half an hour before the rest of my family. (Sometimes having kids has its perks! With two little ones in strollers someone helped us with our luggage and we got to skip the giant line!) We started to unpack and settle in so I gave the kids some crayons and coloring books to keep them busy. I'm busy with the suitcases, Matt is looking out the balcony, and Tristan and Preston are playing happily. Then Tristan comes to me and says, "Look at Preston, Mom! He's coloring on the wall!" Little monkey!!! So, the top pic is Tristan and Daddy trying, unsuccessfully, to clean the crayon off the wall. Preston had been helping but I didn't get the camera fast enough. Our room steward got it off, but I was still very embarrassed. We hadn't even been in the room for an hour!

All the crayon excitement wore him out because he fell asleep during the life jacket safety drill. Daddy must be a comfortable bed because he slept all the way back to the room and missed the ship setting sail. Uncle Eric came down and watched with us from our balcony! Tristan loved the big boat!